Sport
The city is home to professional football team, Portsmouth F.C., who play their home games at Fratton Park. They have two Football League titles (from 1949 and 1950) to their name. They are also previous holders of the FA Cup, having won the 2008 competition. Their other FA Cup triumph came in 1939. They returned to the top flight of English football (Premier League) in 2003, having previously been relegated in 1988 after just one season following an exile from the top flight that had stretched back some 30 years. However, in April 2012 they were relegated from the Championship to League One amid serious financial difficulties. Notable current and former players of the club include David James, Jermain Defoe, Sol Campbell, Peter Crouch, Robert Prosinečki, Alan Knight, Paul Walsh, Darren Anderton, Guy Whittingham, Micky Quinn, Mark Hateley and Jimmy Dickinson, who played more than 800 times for his only club and was never booked or sent off, earning him the sobriquet Gentleman Jim.
The City's second team, Moneyfields FC play in the Wessex League Premier Division. Their home ground is Dover Road on the corner with Moneyfields Avenue. Their best season was 2008–09 when they finished third. The City's third team, United Services Portsmouth F.C. play in the Wessex League Division One.
Portsmouth Rugby Football Club play their home games in the London Division 1 at Rugby Camp, Hilsea.
Like many towns on the English south coast, watersports are popular here, particularly sailing and yachting. Locks Sailing Club at Longshore way is the city's premier dinghy sailing club. The city's rowing club is located in Southsea at the seafront near the Hovercraft Terminal.
The city hosted first-class cricket at the United Services Recreation Ground in Burnaby Road from 1882, while from 1895 to 2000 County Championship matches were played there. This arrangement came to an end in 2000 when Hampshire moved all their home matches to their newly built Rose Bowl home.
Portsmouth has a velodrome surrounding an athletics track at the Mountbatten Centre.
Read more about this topic: Portsmouth
Famous quotes containing the word sport:
“Drag racing is a sport of egos, and it’s all male egos.”
—Shirley “Cha Cha” Muldowney (b. 1940)
“If a walker is indeed an individualist there is nowhere he can’t go at dawn and not many places he can’t go at noon. But just as it demeans life to live alongside a great river you can no longer swim in or drink from, to be crowded into safer areas and hours takes much of the gloss off walking—one sport you shouldn’t have to reserve a time and a court for.”
—Edward Hoagland (b. 1932)
“How long, then, Catiline, while you abuse our patience? How long is this madness of yours to make sport of us?”
—Marcus Tullius Cicero (106–43 B.C.)