Brighton

The M23 links London and Brighton, and once a year it becomes shorthand for the fixture the town cares about most: Crystal Palace. The history between them adds an edge that South Coast meetings with Southampton or Bournemouth never quite carry, whatever else those games settle.

The club itself began life in 1901 as Brighton & Hove United, a name dropped before it ever played a match in favour of Brighton & Hove Albion. Honours came early and then sparsely: the Southern League and the FA Charity Shield both arrived in 1910, a pairing the club would not match again for the best part of a century.

What followed was mostly lower-division graft — Third Division South in 1958, the Fourth Division in 1965 — punctuated by one afternoon that still defines a generation of supporters. In the 1983 FA Cup final, Gordon Smith found himself clean through on goal in the last minute against Manchester United, missed, and the replay was lost 4-0. The chance became so synonymous with the day that it is remembered by name — "and Smith must score" — regardless of what else happened in either match.

By 1997 there was no club to speak of losing cup finals: Brighton were close to liquidation, and it was the then-chairman Dick Knight who kept them in existence. The recovery took years to show on the pitch, but Chris Hutton, first as a player and later as manager, eventually took them back into the Premier League in 2017, thirty-four years after that Wembley afternoon. Gary Lineker's spell at the club in the 1980s belongs to an earlier chapter, before the England career that made his name.

Home games are now played at the American Express Community Stadium in Falmer, open since 2011 and holding 31,876, a considerable step up from the old Goldstone Ground. Llewis Dunk, the current captain, has made more Premier League appearances for the club than anyone else in its history, and remains the figure supporters point to when the side needs settling under pressure.