The traditions of football in Valencia are nearly 100 years old and are mostly connected with the history of the famous club FC Valencia. FC Valencia is well-known not only in Spain but all over the world. It is one of the ten best clubs in Europe.
FC Valencia was founded in 1917. Since that time it has won a lot of national competitions and European championships. “Valencia” reached the final of the Champions’ League twice in 2000 and in 2001. Moreover, the club was the football champion of Spain in 2002 and in 2004. In 2004 it also became a winner of the UEFA Cup.
Nowadays FC Valencia is considered to be one of the most expensive clubs of the world. The cost of the club is about 85 mln euro. “Valencia” is the third most popular club of Spain after “Real” and “Barcelona”. But the difference in popularity of these clubs is great. Only 5% of Spaniards support “Valencia”, 25% of them are fans of “Barcelona” and 38% support “Real”.
The main football arena is the stadium of Valencia. It is called “Mestalla”. “Mestalla” like FC Valencia has got long history, which began from the period of wooden stands for spectators in 1923. In 2001 super modern stands for 50 000 spectators were built. But in spite of that and 7 reconstructions “Mestalla” is living the rest of its days. In 2009 FC Valencia is going to open a new stadium “New Mestalla” which will contain 1/3 more seats for the spectators than the present-day “Mestalla”.
Besides FC Valencia there is one more famous club “Alicante”, which belongs to the Second League of the Spanish Championship. “Alicante” is considered to be a failure of the Second League. During the period of 2004-2007 “Alicante” had a chance to get into the First League for three times but each time it was in vain.
