Liverpool was founded in 1892 and joined the Football League the following year. The club has played at Anfield since its formation. The most successful period in Liverpool's history was the 1970s and '80s when Bill Shankly and Bob Paisley led the club to eleven league titles and seven European trophies.
The club's supporters have been involved in two major tragedies. The first was the Heysel Stadium disaster in 1985 in which charging Liverpool fans caused a wall to collapse, killing 39 Juventus supporters and resulting in English clubs being banned from European competitions for five years. In the 1989 Hillsborough disaster, 96 Liverpool supporters lost their lives in a crush against perimeter fencing.
Liverpool has long-standing rivalries with neighbours Everton and with Manchester United. The team changed from red shirts and white shorts to an all-red home strip in 1964. The club's anthem is "You'll Never Walk Alone".
Because of its successful history, Liverpool is often featured when football is depicted in British culture and has appeared in a number of media firsts. The club appeared in the first edition of the BBC's Match of the Day, which screened highlights of its match against Arsenal at Anfield on 22 August 1964. The first football match to be televised in colour was between Liverpool and West Ham United, broadcast live in March 1967. Liverpool fans featured in the Pink Floyd song "Fearless", in which they sang excerpts from "You'll Never Walk Alone". To mark the club's appearance in the 1988 FA Cup Final, Liverpool released a song known as the "Anfield Rap", featuring John Barnes and other members of the squad.
A documentary drama on the Hillsborough disaster, written by Jimmy McGovern, was screened in 1996. It features Christopher Eccleston as Trevor Hicks, whose story is the focus of the script. Hicks, who lost two teenage daughters in the disaster, went on to campaign for safer stadiums and helped to form the Hillsborough Families Support Group. Liverpool features in the film The 51st State (also known as Formula 51), in which ex-hitman Felix DeSouza (Robert Carlyle) is a keen supporter of the team and the last scene takes place at a match between Liverpool and Manchester United. The club was featured in a children's television show called Scully; the plot revolved around a young boy, Francis Scully, who tried to gain a trial match with Liverpool. The show featured prominent Liverpool players of the time such as Kenny Dalglish. Liverpool made world headlines in Australia playing Melbourne Victory in a highly publicised pre-season friendly match, in front of over 95,400 spectators from all over south east Asia.
No comments:
Post a Comment