Crystal Palace

Palace go into 2026/27 as holders of a European trophy, having won the UEFA Conference League in 2026 — the first continental prize in the club's history. It began at Wembley in May 2025, when a 1-0 win over Manchester City settled a competition. The Community Shield followed in August, on penalties against Liverpool.

For most of the century preceding that, the club's landmarks were near-misses: the League Cup final of 1979, lost to Nottingham Forest; third place in the top flight in 1990/91, the season after Geoff Thomas had driven the side to Wembley. Ian Wright arrived in that era and left in 1998 as the leading scorer in the club's history, 185 goals in all competitions. Wilfried Zaha, an academy product who debuted in 2010, stayed eleven years and finished as Palace's most prolific Premier League scorer.

Selhurst Park has been home since 1924 and holds 25,194. Before it there were three grounds in nineteen years, the moves forced rather than chosen: the club had played inside the grounds of the Crystal Palace itself until the Admiralty requisitioned the site in 1914, after which it borrowed a ground at Herne Hill and then took over Croydon Common's.

The red and blue stripes date only from 1973. Until that year the shirts were claret and blue and the nickname was the Glaziers.

The Palace owners had founded the club on 10 September 1905 for a straightforward reason: they had a stadium and wanted matches played in it.