ACF Fiorentina

Fiorentina Football Club (Associazione Calcio Fiorentina, referred to as ACF Fiorentina) is a football club located in Florence, Tuscany, Italy. It currently competes in Serie A and was founded on August 26, 1926. Fiorentina won two Serie A championships in the 1950s and 1960s. After that, they were in the middle and lower reaches of the league for a long time and were relegated many times. In 2002, he declared bankruptcy due to financial deficit and was punished by the Italian Football Association with a relegation. Later, with the support of shoe businessman Diego Della Valle, a new team Florentia Viola was formed and started playing in the Italian League C. In the summer of 2003, Della Valle bought back the name "Fiorentina" and once again competed under the name Fiorentina. In 2004, they defeated Perugia in the promotion play-offs and returned to the First Division. The team initially used red and white as its team colors, but later changed to purple and white. There is a pair of lilies on its emblem, so Florence is also known as the purple lily. Florence was founded on August 26, 1926 by the merger of Libertas and Club Sportivo Firenze. The first club championship came from the Italian Cup championship in 1939/1940. In 1956, Fiorentina reached the top of Serie A for the first time with 12 wins, 5 wins and an unbeaten record at home, breaking the record of Serie A championship monopoly by AC Milan, Inter Milan and Juventus. Afterwards, Fiorentina finished second in four consecutive seasons and reached the second UEFA Champions League final in 1957, but lost to Real Madrid, which was in full swing at the time. In the 1960/1961 season, the club first won the second Italian Cup trophy, and then reached the European Cup Champions League final and defeated Glasgow Rangers of Scotland to win the club's first European championship. The following year, it reached the final again, but failed to defend the title against Atletico Madrid. In the mid-to-late 1960s, they continued to maintain their momentum and first won the Mitropa Cup, and then won the league championship for the second time in the history of the 1968/1969 season. Fiorentina began to decline in the 1970s. In the 1992/1993 season, due to defeats to Brescia and Udinese, it ranked 16th and was relegated. However, a year later it returned to the top league as the second division champion. With the joining of Argentinian striker Batistuta, Florence became one of the strongest teams in Serie A in the 1990s. It won the Italian Cup twice (1995/96, 2000/01), and Batistuta once became the symbol of Florence. Due to the size of the club, the team lacked sufficient financial resources to strengthen its personnel. Batistuta's departure also greatly weakened the team's strength. In addition, financial problems arose in 2001. In addition to being unable to pay salaries, the team was in debt of up to US$50 million. At that time, president Vittorio Cecchi Gori did not consider the financial situation of the club and instead vigorously acquired players. In the 2001/2002 season, the club ranked second in the league and was relegated to Serie B. In July of the same year, it was unable to hand over the US$40 million guarantee to participate in Serie B. The club officially declared bankruptcy on August 1. However, the Italian Football Association wanted to allow Florence to occupy an important position in the Italian football scene, so it was chartered to participate in Serie C. It also received the help of domestic famous brand shoe manufacturer Diego Della Valle to form a new team Florentia Viola. Fiorentina performed well in the C-League League, easily winning the championship with 20 wins, 10 draws and 4 losses and promoted to the C-League. In the summer of 2003, President Della Valle bought back the name "Fiorentina" for 2.5 million euros and restored the identity of Florence to participate in the competition. At the same time, the Italian Football Association expanded the second division league to 24 teams in the 2003/2004 season, so it retained Calcio Catania (Calcio Catania), Genoa (Genoa Cricket & Football Club), Salernitana Calcio 1919 (Salernitana Calcio 1919) and Cosenza (Cosenza), which were originally dropped from the league last season. Later, due to financial constraints in the latter, the Italian Football Association finally chose Florence to take its place in the second division league. After hard work, Fiorentina finished sixth in the league and had to compete with Perugia, which was 15th in Group A, to qualify for the next season's Serie A. Florence defeated its opponent 1-0 in the first round, and then tied with its opponent 1-1 in the second round. The final total score was 2-1 to participate in Serie A again after 2 years. This team, which was still in the C-League in 2003, returned to the top league in just 2 years. In the two seasons from 2007 to 2008 and 2008 to 2009, Florence ranked fourth in Serie A and qualified for the Champions League for two consecutive years. In the 2011-2012 season, Florence's performance fell sharply and experienced the biggest downturn in recent years. End of the season against Novartis