Leça F.C.

Leça Futebol Clube, better known as Leça FC or simply Leça, is a Portuguese football club located in the town of Leça da Palmeira, Matosinhos. Founded in 1912, they currently play in the Portuguese Second Division and, in the previous season of 2007-08, they finished 10th in the division. They currently play their home games at the Estádio do Leça FC, which holds a capacity of 12,000 spectators. The current chairman is Fernando Monteiro and their current manager is Serbian Milic Jovanović. The club's shirt and socks are white while their shorts are green. Their kit manufacturer is Umbro.

History

The club is most known for its football team that now competes in the Liga de Honra, the second highest level of football in Portugal. The team participated in the Portuguese Liga from 1995 to 1998 but a decision taken by the Portuguese Football Federation based on past acts of corruption decided to relegate Leça to the Liga de Honra for 1998-99 season. The team was expected to fight for promotion but the efforts were not enough to bring the team to the top level again. In the upcoming years, the club was affected by financial problems that cut some of the desire of wanting the team back to the top. Because of the team's lower budget, new goals where set. The main goal was now to make the club financially secure and then try to put the team back on the first division.

However, after a series of events of bad management of the financial status by the presidents, it has been related that some of the presidents stole money from the club to use for their own benefit, which was unpaid wages to the team professionals, unqualified team coaches and other sporting factors. Since then, they've been dubbed as strong candidates to promotion but never confirmed the expectations, finishing in mid-table and surprisingly sometimes near the bottom of the table. In the most recent season of 2007-08, they finished 10th in the division with management by manager Milić Jovanović

Current squad

Note: Flags indicate national team as has been defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

Notable former players

• Jaime Magalhães
• Sérgio Conceição
• Ricardo Carvalho
• Zé António
• Bruno Teixeira
• Miguel Reisinho
• Jordão
• Earl Jean
• Wesley John

The Club

The clubs badge signifys a lot of things; for example, the green and white shows the clubs colours and the castles symbolizes the city that they are from, which was the power of their city when the club was established in 1912 in Leça da Palmeira. The crucifix on the badge signifies the club's togetherness and religion. The crucifix has stirred controversy because many people who are of other religions criticised the club, such as the Turkish Football Federation, who fought it was disrespecting their country with that religion. Leça is not the only club with religious features on their badges: C.F. Os Belenenses, FC Paços de Ferreira and other clubs from different countries, like the old badge of F.C. Internazionale Milano and FC Barcelona, all feature or featured religious aspects on their badge.

Stadium

Leça plays their games at the Estádio do Leça FC. The current stadium has played host to many matches down the years in the Portuguese Liga or in the Liga de Honra. It currently has a capacity of 12,000 spectators and has two big stands in green and white which symbolizes the clubs colours. The stands also feature the name of the club on both sides of the pitch. The club constructed the stadium in 1992 were in that time Leça were ready to go in the top flight of Portuguese football.

External links

• Leça FC official site (Portuguese)
• LeçaSempre - Leça F.C. fans site (Portuguese)
• Squad at Zerozero