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Full name | Manchester City Football Club |
Nickname(s) | City, The Citizens, The Blues |
Founded | 1880 as St Mark's (West Gorton) |
Ground | City of Manchester Stadium,
Manchester
(Capacity: 47,726) |
Owner | Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan |
Chairman | Khaldoon Al Mubarak |
Manager | Roberto Mancini |
League | Premier League |
2010–11 | Premier League, 3rd |
Website | Homepage |
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Manchester City Football Club is an English Premier League football club based in Manchester. Founded in 1880 as St. Mark's (West Gorton), they became Ardwick Association Football Club in 1887 and Manchester City in 1894. The club has played at the City of Manchester Stadium since 2003, having played at Maine Road from 1923.
The club's most successful period was in the late 1960s and early 1970s when they won the League Championship, FA Cup, League Cup and European Cup Winners' Cup under the management team of Joe Mercer and Malcolm Allison. After losing the 1981 FA Cup Final, the club went through a period of decline culminating in relegation to the third tier of English football in 1998 for the first time in their history. The club has since regained top flight status where they have spent the majority of their history. In 2011, Manchester City qualified for the Champions League and won the FA Cup.
STADIUMS
A panorama of the City of Manchester Stadium
Manchester City's current stadium is the City of Manchester Stadium, also known as Eastlands and the Etihad Stadium since July 2011 because of sponsorship commitments. The stadium is situated in East Manchester and is part of a 200-year operating lease from Manchester City Council after the 2002 Commonwealth Games. The stadium has been City's home since the end of the 2002–03 season, when the club moved from Maine Road.[85] Before moving to the stadium, Manchester City spent in excess of £30 million to convert it to football use. The field of play was lowered by several metres, adding an additional tier of seating around the entire pitch. A new North Stand was also built.[86] The inaugural match at the new stadium was a 2–1 win over FC Barcelona in a friendly match.[87] The current capacity as of summer 2011 stands at 47,726 after various stadium renovations under the new owners since 2008.
Manchester City have used several grounds during their history: after playing home matches at five different stadia between 1880 and 1887, the club settled at Hyde Road, its home for 36 years.[88] After a fire destroyed the Main Stand in 1920, the club started to seek a new site and moved to the 84-000 capacity Maine Road three years later. Maine Road, nicknamed the "Wembley of the North" by its designers, hosted the largest-ever crowd at an English club ground when 84,569 attended an FA Cup tie against Stoke City on 3 March 1934.[89] Though Maine Road was redeveloped several times over its 80-year lifespan, by 1995 its capacity was restricted to 32,000, prompting the search for a new ground which culminated in the move to the City of Manchester Stadium in 2003.
PLAYERS
First-team squad
No. | | Position | Player |
2 | | DF | Micah Richards |
4 | | DF | Vincent Kompany (captain) |
5 | | DF | Pablo Zabaleta |
6 | | DF | Joleon Lescott |
7 | | MF | James Milner |
10 | | FW | Edin Džeko |
11 | | MF | Adam Johnson |
12 | | GK | Stuart Taylor |
13 | | DF | Aleksandar Kolarov |
15 | | DF | Stefan Savić |
16 | | FW | Sergio Agüero |
18 | | MF | Gareth Barry |
19 | | MF | Samir Nasri |
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No. | | Position | Player |
20 | | MF | Owen Hargreaves |
21 | | MF | David Silva |
22 | | DF | Gaël Clichy |
25 | | GK | Joe Hart |
28 | | DF | Kolo Touré |
30 | | GK | Costel Pantilimon (on loan from Politehnica Timişoara) |
32 | | FW | Carlos Tévez |
34 | | MF | Nigel de Jong |
37 | | GK | Gunnar Nielsen |
42 | | MF | Yaya Touré |
45 | | FW | Mario Balotelli |
62 | | MF | Abdul Razak |
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