Genoa Tickets

Genoa
Genoa Cricket and Football Club is a professional football club based in the city of Genoa in Italy. Although the athletics and cricket club was founded in 1893 by Englishmen; the foot balling section of the club was opened in 1897 by James Richardson Spensley making it the oldest of its kind still active in Italy.

During their long history, Genoa have won the Italian Football Championship nine times; the first of which was 1898 during the competition's inaugural season, the last time they won the league was in 1923?24. They have also won the Coppa Italia once. Historically, Genoa are the tenth most successful club in Italian football, however they are the fourth most successful in terms of championships won.

The club has played its home games at the 36,536 capacity Stadio Luigi Ferraris since 1911. Since 1946, the ground has been shared with local rivals Sampdoria. Genoa often bounced between the top two divisions of Italian football; Serie A and Serie B since the 1960s. After a recent promotion, Genoa is playing in Serie A again for the first time since 1995.

As Genoa was founded by Englishmen the first ever colours of the club resembled that of the England national football team. Not long into the club's foot balling history, the kit was changed to white and blue stripes in 1899; the blue was chosen to represent the sea as Genoa is a port city. Finally the club settled for their most famous red and blue halves shirt, this gained them the nickname of rossoblu.

One of the nicknames of Genoa is Il Grifone which means the griffin; this is derived from the coat of arms belonging to the city of Genoa. The coat of arms features two golden griffins, either side of the cross of St. George. The actual club badge of Genoa Cricket and Football Club is heavily derived from the city coat of arms, but also incorporated the club's red and blue colours.

Genoa has around a million fans in Italy, mostly from Liguria, however they are also popular in Piedmont and the Aosta Valley. The appeal of Genoa has stretched further than just Italy, as there are fan clubs in Amsterdam, Tokyo, Toronto, New York, Iceland and other places.

Genoa fans in 2007, celebrating their return to Serie A. The most significant and traditional rivalry for Genoa, is the inner-city one with the club whom they share a ground with; Sampdoria. The two clubs compete together in the heated Derby della Lanterna (Derby of the Lantern); a reference to the Genoa lighthouse. The ultras of Genoa also have a strong distaste for AC Milan, after a tragedy in January 1995 when Genoa fan Vincenzo Spagnolo was stabbed to death by a Milanese hooligan.

Conversely, the fans of Genoa have a long standing friendship with Napoli which goes back to 1982. On the last day of the 2006?07 season, both were promoted back into Serie A; Genoa ultras could be seen holding up banners saying benvenuto fratello napoletano, meaning, Welcome, Neapolitan brothers, and the two sets of fans celebrated together.