DIAL SQUARE, ROYAL ARSENAL, WOOLWICH ARSENAL, THE ARSENAL( ARSENAL )

Arsenal were founded as Dial Square in 1886 by a group of workers employed by the Dial Square workshop at the Royal Arsenal, an armaments factory in Woolwich, Kent (formally part of the new County of London from 1889). They were led by a Scotsman, David Danskin, who purchased the club's first football, and Jack Humble. Among their number was the former Nottingham Forest goalkeeper Fred Beardsley, who would later along with Morris Bates obtain a set of red kits from his old club, thus giving Arsenal the colours they still wear today.

Dial Square played their first match on 11 December 1886 against Eastern Wanderers on an open field on the Isle of Dogs, which they won 6–0.  The club were renamed Royal Arsenal soon after, reportedly on Christmas Day.  Initially the club played on Plumstead Common, but soon sought alternative homes, firstly the Sportsman Ground in Plumstead before moving to the adjacent Manor Ground in 1888. Unhappy with the Manor Ground's poor facilities, the club moved to the nearby Invicta Ground in 1890, before returning to the Manor Ground three years later as the Invicta Ground's rent proved too expensive.

During this period, Royal Arsenal started to win local trophies, winning both the Kent Senior Cup and London Charity Cup in 1889–90 and the London Senior Cup in 1890–91; they also entered the FA Cup for the first time in 1889–90. However, the gulf between Arsenal and the professional sides from the North soon became apparent, and Arsenal faced the threat of their amateur players being lured away by the money professional sides could offer; after Derby County had played Arsenal in an FA Cup tie in 1891, they attempted to sign two of Arsenal's amateur players on professional contracts.  Royal Arsenal's move to professionalism in 1891 was frowned upon by many of the amateur southern clubs, and they were banned from participating in local competitions by the London Football Association.  With friendlies and the FA Cup the only matches available for Royal Arsenal, they attempted to set up a southern equivalent of The Football League, but the move failed.  The club changed its name to Woolwich Arsenal in 1893 when it formed a limited liability company to raise capital to purchase the Manor Ground.  Woolwich Arsenal's future looked bleak until the Football League came to their rescue by inviting them to join in 1893. Arsenal were the first Southern club to enter the League, initially joining the Second Division; in response, some of the club's amateur players who rejected professionalism and wanted a workers' team to represent just the Royal Arsenal, broke away to form a short-lived alternative side, Royal Ordnance Factories.

Woolwich Arsenal (in dark shirts) playing Newcastle United (in striped shirts) in an FA Cup semi-final – the club's first  – at the Victoria Ground, Stoke on 31 March 1906; Newcastle won 2–0.

Woolwich Arsenal played in the Second Division for eleven seasons, and generally occupied mid-table before the appointment of Harry Bradshaw as manager in 1899; Bradshaw and his star signings, including goalkeeper Jimmy Ashcroft (Arsenal's first England international) and captain Jimmy Jackson, won promotion to the First Division in 1903–04. However, Bradshaw moved on to Fulham in May 1904, before the Gunners had kicked a ball in the top flight. Despite some strong performances in the FA Cup – the club reached the semi-finals in 1905–06 and 1906–07 – Arsenal were never able to challenge for the League title, only twice finishing above tenth place in the First Division between 1904 and 1913.

The chief cause of this decline was the club's ongoing financial problems; despite the boom in football during the early 20th century, the club's geographic isolation, in the relatively under populated area of Plumstead (then on the outskirts of urban London), meant attendances and thus income were low. To stay afloat, Woolwich Arsenal were forced to sell their star players (including Ashcroft, as well as Tim Coleman and Bert Freeman), and slowly started to slip down the table, which compounded their financial situation as crowds fell. By the end of the decade the average attendance at Manor Ground was 11,000, a little over half of what it had been in 1904. The club were close to bankruptcy, and in 1910 went into voluntary liquidation before being bought out by a consortium of businessmen; the largest shareholder amongst the new owners was the property magnate Sir Henry Norris, who was also the chairman of Fulham.

The novel Making the Arsenal by Tony Attwood, (published by First and Best, www.woolwicharsenal.co.uk) includes the argument that crowds at Woolwich Arsenal were down in 1910 because of the closure of the torpedo factory and its removal to the Clyde that year. It also suggests that after Norris failed to get an agreement to amalgamation with Fulham he instead sought to have Woolwich Arsenal play at Craven Cottage on alternative Saturdays. This plan was abandoned when he was forced to agree that Woolwich Arsenal would stay at the Manor Ground for at least two years from the summer of 1910. Norris was acutely aware of the problems associated with Woolwich Arsenal's location, and was desperate to improve the club's income. First, Norris tried to merge Woolwich Arsenal with his other club, Fulham. When that was blocked by the Football League, Norris abandoned the merger and looked to move the club elsewhere, eventually picking a site in Highbury, north London. Despite objections both from Woolwich-based fans and residents of Highbury, Norris tenaciously saw the move through. He reportedly spent £125,000 ( Historic Opportunity cost of that project is £12,530,000.00, Labour cost of that project is £42,450,000.00, Economic cost of that project is £88,070,000.00[15]) on building the new stadium, designed by Archibald Leitch, on a divinity college's playing fields. Woolwich Arsenal moved there in the 1913 close season, having finished bottom and relegated to the Second Division in 1912–13. They replaced the "Woolwich" in their name with "The" in April 1914, finally becoming plain "Arsenal" in November 1919, although the press at the time continued to refer to them as "The Arsenal" and some still do.

The club controversially rejoined the First Division in 1919, despite only finishing sixth in 1914–15, the last season of competitive football before the First World War had intervened — although an error in the calculation of goal average meant Arsenal had actually finished fifth, an error which was corrected by the Football League in 1975. The First Division was being expanded from 20 teams to 22, and the two new entrants were elected at an AGM of the Football League. One of the extra places was given to Chelsea, who had finished 19th in the First Division and thus had been already relegated. The other spot could have gone to 20th-placed Tottenham Hotspur (also relegated), or to Barnsley or Wolves, who had finished third and fourth in the Second Division respectively.

Instead, the League decided to promote sixth-placed Arsenal, for reasons of history over merit; Norris argued that Arsenal be promoted for their "long service to league football", having been the first League club from the South.  The League board agreed; they voted eighteen votes to eight to promote Arsenal ahead of their local rivals Tottenham Hotspur,  which has fuelled the long-standing enmity between the two clubs. If "long service to league football" was the criterion for promoting Arsenal instead of Tottenham then Wolves, who finished two points ahead of Arsenal and were founder members of the Football League, would appear to have a stronger claim. It has been alleged that this was due to backroom deals or even outright bribery by Sir Henry Norris, colluding with his friend John McKenna, the chairman of Liverpool and the Football League, who recommended Arsenal's promotion at the AGM.

No conclusive proof of wrongdoing has come to light, though other aspects of Norris's financial dealings unrelated to the promotion controversy have fuelled speculation on the matter; Norris resigned as chairman and left the club in 1929, having been found guilty by the Football Association of financial irregularities; he was found to have misused his expenses account, and to have pocketed the proceeds of the sale of the Arsenal team bus. Regardless of the circumstances of their promotion in 1919, Arsenal have remained in the top division since then, and as a result hold the English record for the longest unbroken stretch of top-flight football.

There appear to be no extant records of the meetings which elected Arsenal to the First Division in 1919, however the book Making the Arsenal proposes a different reason for their election in that year. The site argues that the match fixing issues of the final year of football before the war (1914–15) were used by Norris as a weapon in his battle to get Arsenal promoted. He demanded that Liverpool and Manchester United (who had been found guilty of match fixing) be punished by relegation or expulsion, and threatened to organise a breakaway from the league by Midlands and southern clubs if nothing was done. To placate him the League offered Arsenal a place in the First Division.

Arsenal's squad for the 1920–21 season, the club's best under Leslie Knighton, finishing ninth in the First Division.

The move to Highbury brought about much larger crowds; the average attendance in Arsenal's first season at the new ground was 23,000 (compared to 11,000 at the Manor Ground) and rose further after promotion in 1919, finally warding off the spectre of financial ruin. However, Arsenal's return to the First Division was not immediately successful. Under Leslie Knighton, the club never finished better than ninth, and in 1923–24 came close to returning to the Second Division, finishing 19th and only a point clear of the relegation zone. Arsenal did no better the following season, finishing 20th (although paradoxically the club were a lot safer this time, being seven points clear of the relegation places), which was the last straw for Norris; he fired Knighton in May 1925, and appointed the Huddersfield

SOCIEDAD MADRID (REAL MADRID)

Football was introduced to Spain by students of the Institución Libre de Enseñanza. They included several Oxbridge graduates. In 1895 they founded the club Football goal, playing on Sunday mornings at Moncloa. In 1900 this club split into two different clubs New Foot-Ball de Madrid and Club Español de Madrid. The president of the latter club was Julián Palacios. In 1902 the latter club split again, resulting in the formation of Sociedad Madrid FC on March 6, 1902. The first president was Juan Padrós Rubió; the first secretary was Manuel Mendía; and the first treasurer was José de Gorostizaga. Juan Padrós Rubió would be later succeeded by his brother, Carlos Padrós from Spain. In 1905, only three years after its foundation, Madrid FC already won its first major title in the Estadio Chamartín stadium. The team won the first of four consecutive Copa del Rey - titles (at that time the only statewide competition). In 1912 they moved to their first ground called Campo de O'Donnell after moving between some minor grounds.[1] In 1920 the club's name was changed into Real Madrid after King Alfonso XIII, a reputed football fan, granted the title of Real (Royal) to the club. However, when the Second Spanish Republic was proclaimed the club dropped both the word Real and the royal crown from the emblem, being known from then and until the end of the Spanish Civil War as Madrid C. F. only. The addition of the purple band to the emblem dates back to the Republican period and has remained there since then. In 1937, due to the stagnation of the ongoing civil war, all activity disappeared and the club virtually ceased to exist.

Before becoming President in 1945, Santiago Bernabéu Yeste had already carried out the functions of player, first-team captain, club maintenance, first-team manager and director, in an association with the club that lasted nearly 70 years. He was responsible for rebuilding the club after the Spanish Civil War, and under his presidency, the Santiago Bernabéu Stadium and the Ciudad Deportiva. Real Madrid has a newly named stadium which is the Alfredo di Stéfano Stadium.

He also reorganized the club at all levels, in what would become the normal operating hierarchy of professional clubs in the future, giving every section and level of the club independent technical teams and recruiting staff such as Raimundo Saporta. Moreover, under Bernabéu's tutelage, during the 1950s former Real Madrid Amateurs player Miguel Malbo founded Real Madrid's youth academy, or "cantera", known today as La Fábrica.

Finally, beginning in 1953 he embarked upon a strategy of signing world-class players from abroad, the most prominent of them being the signing of Alfredo di Stéfano and built the world's first truly multinational side. During Bernabéu's presidency many of Real Madrid's most legendary names played for the club, including the aforementioned Alfredo Di Stéfano, Ferenc Puskás, Francisco Gento, Héctor Rial, Raymond Kopa, José Santamaría, Miguel Muñoz, Amancio, Santillana. Under the administration of UEFA, it is the world's premier club tournament.

It was under Bernabéu's guidance, that Real Madrid became established as a major force in both Spanish and European football. Before passing away in 1978, Bernabéu had been the club's president for 33 years, during which he won 1 Intercontinental Cup, 6 European Cups, 16 La Liga titles, and 6 Spanish Cups.

The Brother Of FC Basel And FC Zürich (Barcelona).

On 22 October 1899, Joan Gamper placed an advertisement in Los Deportes declaring his wish to form a football club. A positive response resulted in a meeting at the Gimnasio Solé on 29 November. Ten players attended: Walter Wild, later to become the first director of the club, Lluís d'Ossó, Bartomeu Terradas, Otto Kunzle, Otto Maier, Enric Ducal, Pere Cabot, Josep Llobet, John Parsons and William Parsons. As a result, Football Club Barcelona was born.  The blue and red colours of the shirt were first worn in a match against Hispania in 1900; the prevailing Catalonia conception is that the colours were chosen by Joan Gamper and are those of his home team, FC Basel.

FC Barcelona quickly emerged as one of the leading clubs in Spain, competing in the Campeonato de Cataluña and the Copa del Rey. In 1902, the club won its first trophy, the Copa Macaya, and also played in the first Copa del Rey final, losing 2–1 to Bizcaya.

In 1908, Joan Gamper became club president for the first time to save the club from bankruptcy. The club had not won since the Campeonato de Cataluña in 1905; this caused their financial trouble. One of his main achievements was to help Barcelona acquire its own stadium and thus achieve a stable income.

On 14 March 1909, the team Marca Hispanica moved into the Camp de la Indústria, a stadium with a capacity of 8,000. To celebrate their new surroundings, a logo contest was held the following year. Carles Comamala won the contest, and his suggestion became the crest that the club still wears as of 2012, with some minor changes.

With the new stadium, Barcelona participated in the inaugural version of the Pyrenees Cup, which, at the time, consisted of the best teams of Languedoc, Midi and Aquitaine (Southern France), the Basque Country and Catalonia; all were former members of the region. The contest was generally considered the most prestigious in that era.  From the inaugural year in 1910 to 1913, Barcelona won the competition four consecutive times.  Carles Comamala played an integral part of the four-time 

champion, managing the side along with Amechazurra and Jack Greenwell. The latter became the club's first full-time coach in 1917.The last edition was held in 1914 in the city of Barcelona, which local rivals Espanyol won.

During the same period, the club changed its official language from Castilian to Catalan and gradually evolved into an important symbol of Catalan identity. For many fans, participating in the club had less to do with the game itself and more with being a part of the club's collective identity. On 4 February 1917, the club held its first testimonial match to honour Ramón Torralba who played from 1913 to 1928. The match was against local side Terrassa, which Barcelona won 6–2.

Gamper simultaneously launched a campaign to recruit more club-members, and, by 1922, the club had more than 20,000, who helped finance a new stadium. The club then moved to the new Les Cortes, which they inaugurated the same year. Les Cortes had an initial capacity of 22,000, and was later[when?] expanded to 60,000.

Gamper recruited Jack Greenwell as the first full-time manager in Barcelona's history. After he was hired, the club's fortunes began to improve on the field. During the Gamper-led era, Barcelona won eleven Campeonato de Cataluña, six Copa del Rey and four Pyrenees Cups and enjoyed its first "golden age".

MANCHESTER UNITED (THE BEGINNING).

Manchester United Football Club was formed in 1878 as Newton Heath LYR Football Club by the Carriage and Wagon department of the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway depot at Newton Heath. The team initially played games against other departments and rail companies at their home ground at North Road, but by 1888 the club had become a founding member of The Combination  a regional football league.-

"(The first Combination was set up in 1888, the same year the Football League was founded.It consisted of 20 teams, although this proved too many teams for each one to play the other once, let alone twice. Instead each club was to play eight others home and away, making 16 games in total. However unlike the League,the Combination was not centrally organized, but left to individual clubs; as a result confusion ensued, as it was not clear whether many matches between clubs were friendlies or Combination matches. Many fixtures were left unfulfilled, and the Combination was wound up in April 1889)",

 However, following the league's dissolution before the end of its first season, Newton Heath joined the newly formed Football Alliance, which ran for three seasons before being merged with The Football League. This resulted in the club starting the 1892–93 seasons in the First Division, by which time it had become independent of the rail company, dropped the "LYR" from its name and moved to a new ground at Bank Street.  After just two seasons, the club was relegated to the Second Division.

In January 1902, with debts of £2,670 – equivalent to £250,000 as of 2013 – the club was served with a winding-up order. Captain Harry Stafford found four local businessmen – including John Henry Davies, who became club president – each willing to invest £500 in return for a direct interest in running the club. As a mark of this fresh start, on 24 April 1902, the club's name was changed to "Manchester United". Under Ernest Mangnall, who became club secretary in 1903, the team finished as Second Division runners-up in 1906 and secured promotion to the First Division, which it won in 1908 – the club's first league title. The following season began with victory in the first ever Charity Shield and ended with the club's first FA Cup title. Manchester United moved to a new stadium at Old Trafford in 1910, and won the First Division for the second time in 1911, but at the end of the following season, secretary Mangnall left to join Manchester City.

In 1922, three years after the resumption of football following the First World War, the club was relegated to the Second Division, where it remained until regaining promotion in 1925. Relegated again in 1931, Manchester United became a yo-yo club, achieving its all-time lowest position of 20th place in the Second Division in 1934. Following the death of John Henry Davies in October 1927, the club's finances deteriorated to the extent that Manchester United would likely have gone bankrupt had it not been for an investment of £2,000 in December 1931 by James W. Gibson, who assumed control of the club.[9] In the 1938–39 season – the last year of football before the Second World War – the club finished 14th in the First Division. During the war, the club participated in the Wartime League and the Football League War Cup, but in 1941, Old Trafford was damaged by German bombs and would not be fully repaired until 1949.