Granada CF

Granada has spent most of its footballing life defined by altitude rather than trophies: founded on 6 April 1931 as Club Recreativo Granada under its first president, Julio López Fernández, it took the current name Granada Club de Fútbol only in 1940, and did not become a Sociedad Anónima Deportiva until 2011.

Sixth in La Liga, reached twice, in 1971-72 and 1973-74, and never bettered. The Copa del Rey final, back when the competition still carried Franco's name, ended in a 4-1 defeat to Barcelona in 1959, Ramón Carranza scoring the club's only goal. Between those two dates and well beyond them, Segunda División has been the more familiar address — won outright in 1956-57, 1967-68 and, most recently, 2022-23.

That last promotion opened the door to the best run in the club's history. In 2019-20, playing continental football for the first time, Granada reached the quarter-finals of the Europa League before Manchester United ended the run. It came after a decade in which the club had twice needed outside rescue to survive at all: an Italian partnership with Udinese pulled it out of a financial crisis in 2009, and Chinese businessman Jiang Lizhang took ownership in 2016. Four years after that European run, in 2024, Granada dropped back out of La Liga.