S.S.C. Napoli

Società Sportiva Calcio Napoli, commonly referred to as Napoli, is an Italian professional football club based in Naples and founded in 1926. The club has spent most of its history in Serie A, where it currently plays its 2009–10 season.

Napoli has won Serie A twice, in 1986–87 and 1989–90. It has also won Coppa Italia in its home country three times and one Italian Super Cup, and on the European stage has won the UEFA Cup in 1988–89. Napoli is also the most successful club in Southern Italy and the fourth most supported football club in Italy.

The club has had several name changes since first appearing in 1926; the most important of these was in 1964, when it was changed from Associazione Calcio Napoli to Società Sportiva Calcio Napoli. The most recent change was in 2004, when the club went bankrupt but was refounded by film-producer Aurelio De Laurentiis as Napoli Soccer; he restored the name to Società Sportiva Calcio Napoli in early 2006.

The first club was founded as Naples Foot-Ball & Cricket Club in 1904 by English sailor William Poths and his associate Hector M. Bayon. Neapolitans such as Conforti, Catterina and Amedeo Salsi were also involved, the latter of which was the club's first president. The original kit of the club was a sky blue and navy blue striped shirt, with black shorts. The name of the club was shortened to Naples Foot-Ball Club in 1906.

Early into its existence, the Italian Football Championship was limited to just Northern clubs, so Southern clubs competed against sailors or in cups such as Sir Thomas Lipton's Lipton Challenge Cup. In the cup competed between Naples and Palermo FBC, Naples won three finals. The foreign contingent at the club broke off in 1912 to form Internazionale Napoli, in time for both club's debut in the Italian Championship of 1912–13. Though the sides had a keen rivalry in the Campania section, they were not as successful outside of it and a few years after World War I they merged as Foot-Ball Club Internazionale-Naples, also known as FBC Internaples

Napoli broke the world transfer record fee, turning to Diego Maradona with a $12 million deal from Barcelona on 30 June 1984. The squad was gradually re-built, with the likes of Ciro Ferrara, Salvatore Bagni and Fernando De Napoli filling the ranks. The rise up the tables was gradual, by 1985–86 they had a third place finish under their belts, but better was yet to come. The 1986–87 season was the landmark in Napoli's history; they won the double, securing the Serie A title by three points and then beating Atalanta 4–0 to lift the Coppa Italia.

Diego Maradona holding the UEFA Cup for Napoli.

Because a mainland Southern Italian team had never won the league before, this turned Diego Maradona into a cultural, social and borderline religious icon for Neapolitans, which stretched beyond the realms of just football.

The club were unsuccessful in the European Cup in the following season and finished runners-up in Serie A. However, Napoli were entered into the UEFA Cup for 1988–89 and won their first major European title. Juventus, Bayern Munich and PAOK were defeated on the way to the final, where Napoli beat VfB Stuttgart 5–4 on aggregate, with two goals from Careca and one each from Maradona, Ferrara and Alemão.

Napoli added their second Serie A title in 1989–90, beating AC Milan by two points in the title race. However, this was surrounded by less auspicious circumstances as Napoli were awarded two points for a game, when in Bergamo an Atalanta fan threw a 100 lira coin at Alemão's head. A controversial set of events set off at the 1990 World Cup, when Maradona made comments pertaining to North-South inequality in the country and the risorgimento, asking Neapolitans to root for Argentina in the semi-finals against Italy in Naples.

“ I don't like the fact that now everybody is asking Neapolitans to be Italian and to support their national team. Naples has always been marginalised by the rest of Italy. It is a city that suffers the most unfair racism.”

—Diego Armando Maradona, July 1990

Napoli ultras responded by displaying a banner in their curva that read: "Maradona, Naples loves you, but Italy is our homeland". It was the only stadium during the competition where the Argentine national anthem wasn't jeered, Maradona bowed to the Napoli fans at the end and his country went on to reach the final. However, after the final the Italian Football Federation forced Maradona to take a doping test, which he failed testing positive for cocaine; Napoli and he claimed it was a revenge plot for events at the World Cup. Maradona was banned for 15 months and would never play for the club again. The club still managed to win the Supercoppa Italiana that year, with a record 5–1 victory against Juventus, but it would be their last major trophy. In the European Cup however, they went out in the second round