131-675: The Abu Dhabi United Group for Development and Investment ( ADUG ; Arabic : مجموعة أبوظبي الاتحاد للتنمية والاستثمار ) is a United Arab Emirates (UAE) based private equity company. It is owned by Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan , member of the Abu Dhabi Royal Family and Vice President of the UAE. Leaks of internal documents show that the Abu Dhabi government manages the accounts belonging to ADUG. ADUG insists it
262-542: A heraldic badge was granted by the College of Arms to the English Football League for use by City. The badge consisted of the familiar ship above a red rose but on a circular device instead of a shield (blazoned as " A roundel per fess azure and argent in chief a three masted ship sails set pennons flying or in base a rose gules barbed and seeded proper "). On occasions when Manchester City played in
393-490: A notable rivalry with Liverpool , currently considered one of the biggest in association football. Though the two clubs had been involved in a title race in the 1976–77 season , Liverpool and City's modern rivalry began in the 2010s, with the Blues beating Liverpool to the 2013–14 title by just two points on the final day of the season. In the final of the 2015–16 League Cup , City defeated Liverpool on penalties after
524-529: A 1–1 draw. The two clubs met in European competition for the first time in the 2017–18 Champions League quarter-finals, where Liverpool won 5–1 on aggregate , ultimately reaching the final and then winning the competition a year later. In the 2018–19 season , City again won the title on the final day, with the Blues' 98 points and Liverpool's 97 being the third- and fourth-highest Premier League points totals ever. The following season , Liverpool clinched
655-737: A British-based holding company valued at £3.73 ($ 4.8) billion in November 2019 and majority-owned by the Abu Dhabi United Group . City gained their first honours by winning the Second Division in 1899 ; with it came promotion to the highest level in English football, the First Division . They went on to claim their first major honour on 23 April 1904 , beating Bolton Wanderers 1–0 at Crystal Palace to win
786-532: A European trophy and a domestic trophy in the same season. The club continued to challenge for honours throughout the 1970s, finishing one point behind the league champions on two occasions and reaching the final of the 1974 League Cup . One of the matches from this period that is most fondly remembered by supporters of Manchester City is the final match of the 1973–74 season against arch-rivals Manchester United, who needed to win to have any hope of avoiding relegation. Former United player Denis Law scored with
917-605: A backheel to give City a 1–0 win at Old Trafford and confirm the relegation of their rivals. The final trophy of the club's most successful period of the 20th century was won in 1976, when Newcastle United were beaten 2–1 in the League Cup final . A long period of decline followed the success of the 1960s and 1970s. Malcolm Allison rejoined the club to become manager for the second time in 1979, but squandered large sums of money on several unsuccessful signings, such as Steve Daley . A succession of managers then followed – seven in
1048-575: A collection of related dialects that constitute the precursor of Arabic, first emerged during the Iron Age . Previously, the earliest attestation of Old Arabic was thought to be a single 1st century CE inscription in Sabaic script at Qaryat al-Faw , in southern present-day Saudi Arabia. However, this inscription does not participate in several of the key innovations of the Arabic language group, such as
1179-435: A corpus of poetic texts, in addition to Qur'an usage and Bedouin informants whom he considered to be reliable speakers of the ʿarabiyya . Arabic spread with the spread of Islam . Following the early Muslim conquests , Arabic gained vocabulary from Middle Persian and Turkish . In the early Abbasid period , many Classical Greek terms entered Arabic through translations carried out at Baghdad's House of Wisdom . By
1310-1081: A dialect of Arabic and written in the Latin alphabet . The Balkan languages, including Albanian, Greek , Serbo-Croatian, and Bulgarian , have also acquired many words of Arabic origin, mainly through direct contact with Ottoman Turkish . Arabic has influenced languages across the globe throughout its history, especially languages where Islam is the predominant religion and in countries that were conquered by Muslims. The most markedly influenced languages are Persian , Turkish , Hindustani ( Hindi and Urdu ), Kashmiri , Kurdish , Bosnian , Kazakh , Bengali , Malay ( Indonesian and Malaysian ), Maldivian , Pashto , Punjabi , Albanian , Armenian , Azerbaijani , Sicilian, Spanish, Greek, Bulgarian, Tagalog , Sindhi , Odia , Hebrew and African languages such as Hausa , Amharic , Tigrinya , Somali , Tamazight , and Swahili . Conversely, Arabic has borrowed some words (mostly nouns) from other languages, including its sister-language Aramaic, Persian, Greek, and Latin and to
1441-619: A financially precarious position. Thaksin Shinawatra had taken control of the club the year before, but his political travails saw his assets frozen. Then, in August 2008, City were purchased by the Abu Dhabi United Group . The takeover was immediately followed by a flurry of bids for high-profile players; the club broke the British transfer record by signing Brazilian international Robinho from Real Madrid for £32.5 million. There
SECTION 10
#17327725767671572-406: A frequent sight in the 1988–89 season , as the craze spread to other clubs (inflatable fish were seen at Grimsby Town ), with the craze reaching its peak at City's match at Stoke City on 26 December 1988, a game declared by fanzines as a fancy dress party. In 2010, Manchester City supporters adopted an exuberant dance, dubbed The Poznań , from fans of Polish club Lech Poznań that they played in
1703-792: A golden eagle was added to the city's badge in 1958 (but had since been removed), representing the growing aviation industry. The shield featured a ship on its upper half representing the Manchester Ship Canal , and three diagonal stripes in the lower half symbolised the city's three rivers – the Irwell , the Irk and the Medlock . The bottom of the badge bore the motto " Superbia in Proelio ", which translates as "Pride in Battle" in Latin . Above
1834-487: A lesser extent and more recently from Turkish, English, French, and Italian. Arabic is spoken by as many as 380 million speakers, both native and non-native, in the Arab world, making it the fifth most spoken language in the world, and the fourth most used language on the internet in terms of users. It also serves as the liturgical language of more than 2 billion Muslims . In 2011, Bloomberg Businessweek ranked Arabic
1965-462: A major cup final, the club wore shirts bearing the City of Manchester coat of arms, as a symbol of pride in representing the city at a major event. This practice originated from a time when the players' shirts did not normally bear a badge of any kind. The club has since abandoned the practice; for the 2011 FA Cup final , its first in the 21st century, City used the usual badge with a special legend, but
2096-638: A merger of two existing organisations in 2010: the Official Supporters Club (OSC) and the Centenary Supporters Association (CSA). City fans' song of choice is a rendition of " Blue Moon ", which despite its melancholic theme is belted out with gusto as though it were a heroic anthem. City supporters tend to believe that unpredictability is an inherent trait of their team, and label unexpected results "typical City". Events that fans regard as "typical City" include
2227-690: A millennium before the modern period . Early lexicographers ( لُغَوِيُّون lughawiyyūn ) sought to explain words in the Quran that were unfamiliar or had a particular contextual meaning, and to identify words of non-Arabic origin that appear in the Quran. They gathered shawāhid ( شَوَاهِد 'instances of attested usage') from poetry and the speech of the Arabs—particularly the Bedouin ʾaʿrāb [ ar ] ( أَعْراب ) who were perceived to speak
2358-650: A new version which would be designed in the style of the older, circular variants. A design purporting to be the new badge was unintentionally leaked two days early prior to the official unveiling on 26 December 2015 by the IPO when the design was trademarked on 22 December. The new badge was officially unveiled at Manchester City's home match against Sunderland on 26 December. Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules . Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality. The following players have previously made appearances or have appeared on
2489-511: A public relations image of a progressive, dynamic Gulf state, which deflects attention from what is really going on in the country". Manchester City was accused of receiving £30 million from an unknown figure from the United Arab Emirates , that was supposed to come from the sponsor. The £30 million payments are expected to be one of the 115 Premier League 's financial charges against Manchester City. The report also claimed that
2620-594: A result, many European languages have borrowed words from it. Arabic influence, mainly in vocabulary, is seen in European languages (mainly Spanish and to a lesser extent Portuguese , Catalan , and Sicilian ) owing to the proximity of Europe and the long-lasting Arabic cultural and linguistic presence, mainly in Southern Iberia, during the Al-Andalus era. Maltese is a Semitic language developed from
2751-503: A rivalry between Jürgen Klopp and Pep Guardiola , the managers of Liverpool and Manchester City, with the two previously having been the respective managers of Der Klassiker rivals Borussia Dortmund and Bayern Munich in the Bundesliga . At the end of the 2018–19 season, Guardiola described his relationship with Klopp as a "beautiful rivalry" and called Klopp's Liverpool team "the strongest opponents I have faced in my career as
SECTION 20
#17327725767672882-462: A script derived from ASA attest to a language known as Hasaitic . On the northwestern frontier of Arabia, various languages known to scholars as Thamudic B , Thamudic D, Safaitic , and Hismaic are attested. The last two share important isoglosses with later forms of Arabic, leading scholars to theorize that Safaitic and Hismaic are early forms of Arabic and that they should be considered Old Arabic . Linguists generally believe that "Old Arabic",
3013-470: A single language, despite mutual incomprehensibility among differing spoken versions. From a linguistic standpoint, it is often said that the various spoken varieties of Arabic differ among each other collectively about as much as the Romance languages . This is an apt comparison in a number of ways. The period of divergence from a single spoken form is similar—perhaps 1500 years for Arabic, 2000 years for
3144-538: A sixth-round FA Cup tie against Stoke City – a record which stood until 2016. The club won the First Division title for the first time in 1937, but were relegated the following season, despite scoring more goals than any other team in the division. Twenty years later, a City team inspired by a tactical system known as the Revie Plan reached consecutive FA Cup finals again, in 1955 and 1956 ; just as in
3275-441: A surprise victory at the same venue. Despite having most of the ball possession and creating 23 attempts at goal, City were made to rue wasteful chances while their opponent on the day converted their chances clinically. Manchester City's home colours are sky blue and white. Traditional away kit colours have been either maroon or (from the 1960s) red and black; however, in recent years several colours have been used. The origins of
3406-407: A team two divisions lower. In the late 1980s, City fans started a craze of bringing inflatable objects to matches, primarily oversized bananas. One disputed explanation for the phenomenon is that in a match against West Bromwich Albion , chants from fans calling for the introduction of Imre Varadi as a substitute mutated into "Imre Banana". Terraces packed with inflatable-waving supporters became
3537-559: A ten-year partnership with Manchester City Council to revamp the east end of the city - not coincidentally the same area in which Manchester City are based - creating the Manchester Life Development Company in conjunction with the council in order to build 6,000 affordable houses in the area. According to Human Rights Watch , ADUG's investment in Manchester City enabled Abu Dhabi to "construct
3668-507: A type of Arabic. Cypriot Arabic is recognized as a minority language in Cyprus. The sociolinguistic situation of Arabic in modern times provides a prime example of the linguistic phenomenon of diglossia , which is the normal use of two separate varieties of the same language, usually in different social situations. Tawleed is the process of giving a new shade of meaning to an old classical word. For example, al-hatif lexicographically means
3799-507: A variety of regional vernacular Arabic dialects , which are not necessarily mutually intelligible. Classical Arabic is the language found in the Quran , used from the period of Pre-Islamic Arabia to that of the Abbasid Caliphate . Classical Arabic is prescriptive, according to the syntactic and grammatical norms laid down by classical grammarians (such as Sibawayh ) and the vocabulary defined in classical dictionaries (such as
3930-476: A wider audience." In the wake of the industrial revolution and European hegemony and colonialism , pioneering Arabic presses, such as the Amiri Press established by Muhammad Ali (1819), dramatically changed the diffusion and consumption of Arabic literature and publications. Rifa'a al-Tahtawi proposed the establishment of Madrasat al-Alsun in 1836 and led a translation campaign that highlighted
4061-737: Is a Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world . The ISO assigns language codes to 32 varieties of Arabic , including its standard form of Literary Arabic, known as Modern Standard Arabic , which is derived from Classical Arabic . This distinction exists primarily among Western linguists; Arabic speakers themselves generally do not distinguish between Modern Standard Arabic and Classical Arabic, but rather refer to both as al-ʿarabiyyatu l-fuṣḥā ( اَلعَرَبِيَّةُ ٱلْفُصْحَىٰ "the eloquent Arabic") or simply al-fuṣḥā ( اَلْفُصْحَىٰ ). Arabic
Abu Dhabi United Group - Misplaced Pages Continue
4192-590: Is a minimum level of comprehension between all Arabic dialects, this level can increase or decrease based on geographic proximity: for example, Levantine and Gulf speakers understand each other much better than they do speakers from the Maghreb. The issue of diglossia between spoken and written language is a complicating factor: A single written form, differing sharply from any of the spoken varieties learned natively, unites several sometimes divergent spoken forms. For political reasons, Arabs mostly assert that they all speak
4323-765: Is a professional football club based in Manchester , England, that competes in the Premier League , the top flight of English football . Founded in 1880 as St. Mark's (West Gorton) , they became Ardwick Association Football Club in 1887 and Manchester City in 1894. The club's home ground is the City of Manchester Stadium , currently known as the Etihad Stadium in east Manchester, to which they moved in 2003, having played at Maine Road since 1923. Manchester City adopted their sky blue home shirts in 1894,
4454-559: Is a sister language rather than their direct ancestor. Arabia had a wide variety of Semitic languages in antiquity. The term "Arab" was initially used to describe those living in the Arabian Peninsula , as perceived by geographers from ancient Greece . In the southwest, various Central Semitic languages both belonging to and outside the Ancient South Arabian family (e.g. Southern Thamudic) were spoken. It
4585-478: Is believed that the ancestors of the Modern South Arabian languages (non-Central Semitic languages) were spoken in southern Arabia at this time. To the north, in the oases of northern Hejaz , Dadanitic and Taymanitic held some prestige as inscriptional languages. In Najd and parts of western Arabia, a language known to scholars as Thamudic C is attested. In eastern Arabia, inscriptions in
4716-408: Is credited with establishing the rules of Arabic prosody . Al-Jahiz (776–868) proposed to Al-Akhfash al-Akbar an overhaul of the grammar of Arabic, but it would not come to pass for two centuries. The standardization of Arabic reached completion around the end of the 8th century. The first comprehensive description of the ʿarabiyya "Arabic", Sībawayhi's al - Kitāb , is based first of all upon
4847-472: Is credited with standardizing Arabic grammar , or an-naḥw ( النَّحو "the way" ), and pioneering a system of diacritics to differentiate consonants ( نقط الإعجام nuqaṭu‿l-i'jām "pointing for non-Arabs") and indicate vocalization ( التشكيل at-tashkīl ). Al-Khalil ibn Ahmad al-Farahidi (718–786) compiled the first Arabic dictionary, Kitāb al-'Ayn ( كتاب العين "The Book of the Letter ع "), and
4978-574: Is not present in the spoken varieties, but deletes Classical words that sound obsolete in MSA. In addition, MSA has borrowed or coined many terms for concepts that did not exist in Quranic times, and MSA continues to evolve. Some words have been borrowed from other languages—notice that transliteration mainly indicates spelling and not real pronunciation (e.g., فِلْم film 'film' or ديمقراطية dīmuqrāṭiyyah 'democracy'). The current preference
5109-855: Is official in Mali and recognized as a minority language in Morocco, while the Senegalese government adopted the Latin script to write it. Maltese is official in (predominantly Catholic ) Malta and written with the Latin script . Linguists agree that it is a variety of spoken Arabic, descended from Siculo-Arabic , though it has experienced extensive changes as a result of sustained and intensive contact with Italo-Romance varieties, and more recently also with English. Due to "a mix of social, cultural, historical, political, and indeed linguistic factors", many Maltese people today consider their language Semitic but not
5240-444: Is separate from the Abu Dhabi government. The primary interest of the group is its 81% majority ownership of City Football Group , a worldwide organisation most notably controlling Manchester City , Mumbai City , Melbourne City and New York City , as well as several other international football clubs. However, it also holds interests in various other endeavours outside of the sporting world with an extensive property portfolio in
5371-572: Is the third most widespread official language after English and French, one of six official languages of the United Nations , and the liturgical language of Islam . Arabic is widely taught in schools and universities around the world and is used to varying degrees in workplaces, governments and the media. During the Middle Ages , Arabic was a major vehicle of culture and learning, especially in science, mathematics and philosophy. As
Abu Dhabi United Group - Misplaced Pages Continue
5502-590: Is the variety used in most current, printed Arabic publications, spoken by some of the Arabic media across North Africa and the Middle East, and understood by most educated Arabic speakers. "Literary Arabic" and "Standard Arabic" ( فُصْحَى fuṣḥá ) are less strictly defined terms that may refer to Modern Standard Arabic or Classical Arabic. Some of the differences between Classical Arabic (CA) and Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) are as follows: MSA uses much Classical vocabulary (e.g., dhahaba 'to go') that
5633-413: Is to avoid direct borrowings, preferring to either use loan translations (e.g., فرع farʻ 'branch', also used for the branch of a company or organization; جناح janāḥ 'wing', is also used for the wing of an airplane, building, air force, etc.), or to coin new words using forms within existing roots ( استماتة istimātah ' apoptosis ', using the root موت m/w/t 'death' put into
5764-524: Is used to denote concepts that have arisen in the industrial and post-industrial era , especially in modern times. Due to its grounding in Classical Arabic, Modern Standard Arabic is removed over a millennium from everyday speech, which is construed as a multitude of dialects of this language. These dialects and Modern Standard Arabic are described by some scholars as not mutually comprehensible. The former are usually acquired in families, while
5895-445: The Lisān al-ʻArab ). Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) largely follows the grammatical standards of Classical Arabic and uses much of the same vocabulary. However, it has discarded some grammatical constructions and vocabulary that no longer have any counterpart in the spoken varieties and has adopted certain new constructions and vocabulary from the spoken varieties. Much of the new vocabulary
6026-675: The Scottish Football Hall of Fame (a.k.a. the Scottish Football Museum Hall of Fame ), and are listed according to the year of their induction within the various categories: Last updated: 30 March 2011. Source: list of SFM Hall of Fame inductees The following former Manchester City players have been inducted into the Welsh Sports Hall of Fame , and are listed according to the year of their induction: Source: Since moving to
6157-558: The 2018–19 season , City completed an unprecedented domestic treble of English men's titles. Apart from winning all three of the major English football tournaments, they also won the Community Shield , the first time any team has ever held all four of England's primary football trophies at the same time. On the continental stage, the club achieved breakthrough in 2020–21 , reaching their first-ever Champions League final . In an all-English affair, City lost 0–1 to Chelsea at
6288-704: The Estádio do Dragão in Porto . The 2022–23 season turned out to be the greatest in the club's history, as Manchester City won their third consecutive Premier League title, the FA Cup final against rivals Manchester United, and their maiden Champions League title at the Atatürk Olympic Stadium in Istanbul against Inter Milan , thereby assembling a rare feat – the continental treble . The road to
6419-732: The Europa League . In 2022, Manchester City proposed the release of the Connected Scarf , that would contain a sensor tracking physiological and emotional data of the wearer, for supporters in 2023. Manchester City's biggest rivalry is with neighbours Manchester United , against whom they contest the Manchester derby . Before the Second World War , when travel to away games was rare, many Mancunian football fans regularly watched both teams even if considering themselves "supporters" of only one. This practice continued into
6550-684: The FA Cup ; the Blues narrowly missed out on a League and Cup double that season after finishing runners-up in the league campaign , but they still became the first club in Manchester to win a major honour. In the seasons following the FA Cup triumph, the club was dogged by allegations of financial irregularities, culminating in the suspension of seventeen players in 1906, including captain Billy Meredith , who subsequently moved across town to Manchester United . A fire at Hyde Road destroyed
6681-460: The FA Cup final for the second straight year but lost in a rematch to rivals Manchester United. Manchester City's era of sustained competitive excellence coincided with charges of breaching Financial Fair Play (FFP) regulations. In 2020, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) ruled that sanctions placed on the club by UEFA were not justified, overturning City's two-year European ban. In 2023,
SECTION 50
#17327725767676812-434: The FA Cup final in 2011, their first major final in over 30 years, after defeating derby rivals Manchester United in the semi-finals, the first time they had knocked their rival out of a cup competition since 1975. The Blues defeated Stoke City 1–0 in the final, securing their fifth FA Cup and the club's first major trophy since winning the 1976 League Cup. On the last day of the 2010–11 season , City beat out Arsenal for
6943-533: The League Cup and regained the Premier League title on the last matchday of the season. The team's league form then slowly declined over the next couple of years, as the Blues finished second in 2014–15 and then dropped to fourth in 2015–16 , although the 2015–16 season would see City win another League Cup title and reach the Champions League semi-finals for the first time. Pep Guardiola , former head coach of Barcelona and Bayern Munich ,
7074-625: The Premier League Hall of Fame . Inaugurated in 2020, but delayed for a year due to the COVID-19 pandemic , the Hall of Fame is intended to recognise and honour players that have achieved great success and made a significant contribution to the league since its founding in 1992 . Last updated: 22 April 2024. Source: list of PL Hall of Fame inductees The following former Manchester City players and managers have been inducted into
7205-406: The United Arab Emirates and Manchester . The Group was founded in the summer of 2008, as Sheikh Mansour looked to take over Manchester City Football Club from the former Prime Minister of Thailand Thaksin Shinawatra and signed off the deal on 1 September 2008, with due diligence completed on 23 September the same year. Sulaiman Al-Fahim was the public face of ADUG during the initial phase of
7336-568: The Xth form , or جامعة jāmiʻah 'university', based on جمع jamaʻa 'to gather, unite'; جمهورية jumhūriyyah 'republic', based on جمهور jumhūr 'multitude'). An earlier tendency was to redefine an older word although this has fallen into disuse (e.g., هاتف hātif 'telephone' < 'invisible caller (in Sufism)'; جريدة jarīdah 'newspaper' < 'palm-leaf stalk'). Colloquial or dialectal Arabic refers to
7467-494: The northern Hejaz . These features are evidence of common descent from a hypothetical ancestor , Proto-Arabic . The following features of Proto-Arabic can be reconstructed with confidence: On the other hand, several Arabic varieties are closer to other Semitic languages and maintain features not found in Classical Arabic, indicating that these varieties cannot have developed from Classical Arabic. Thus, Arabic vernaculars do not descend from Classical Arabic: Classical Arabic
7598-419: The "learned" tradition (Classical Arabic). This variety and both its classicizing and "lay" iterations have been termed Middle Arabic in the past, but they are thought to continue an Old Higazi register. It is clear that the orthography of the Quran was not developed for the standardized form of Classical Arabic; rather, it shows the attempt on the part of writers to record an archaic form of Old Higazi. In
7729-772: The "purest," most eloquent form of Arabic—initiating a process of jamʿu‿l-luɣah ( جمع اللغة 'compiling the language') which took place over the 8th and early 9th centuries. Kitāb al-'Ayn ( c. 8th century ), attributed to Al-Khalil ibn Ahmad al-Farahidi , is considered the first lexicon to include all Arabic roots ; it sought to exhaust all possible root permutations —later called taqālīb ( تقاليب ) — calling those that are actually used mustaʿmal ( مستعمَل ) and those that are not used muhmal ( مُهمَل ). Lisān al-ʿArab (1290) by Ibn Manzur gives 9,273 roots, while Tāj al-ʿArūs (1774) by Murtada az-Zabidi gives 11,978 roots. Manchester City F.C. Manchester City Football Club (or simply Man City F.C. )
7860-454: The 11th and 12th centuries in al-Andalus , the zajal and muwashah poetry forms developed in the dialectical Arabic of Cordoba and the Maghreb. The Nahda was a cultural and especially literary renaissance of the 19th century in which writers sought "to fuse Arabic and European forms of expression." According to James L. Gelvin , " Nahda writers attempted to simplify the Arabic language and script so that it might be accessible to
7991-531: The 1930s, they lost the first one, to Newcastle United , and won the second. The 1956 final, in which the Blues defeated Birmingham City 3–1, saw City goalkeeper Bert Trautmann continuing to play on after unknowingly breaking his neck. After being relegated to the Second Division in 1963 , the future looked bleak with a record low home attendance of 8,015 against Swindon Town in January 1965. In
SECTION 60
#17327725767678122-451: The 1980s alone. Under John Bond , City reached the 1981 FA Cup final but lost in a replay to Tottenham Hotspur . The club were twice relegated from the top flight in the 1980s (in 1983 and 1987 ), but returned to the top flight again in 1989 under Mel Machin . Howard Kendall guided the club to top flight safety in 1990 and the club finished fifth in 1991 and 1992 under the management of active player Peter Reid . However, this
8253-571: The 4th to the 6th centuries, the Nabataean script evolved into the Arabic script recognizable from the early Islamic era. There are inscriptions in an undotted, 17-letter Arabic script dating to the 6th century CE, found at four locations in Syria ( Zabad , Jebel Usays , Harran , Umm el-Jimal ). The oldest surviving papyrus in Arabic dates to 643 CE, and it uses dots to produce the modern 28-letter Arabic alphabet. The language of that papyrus and of
8384-834: The 8th century, knowledge of Classical Arabic had become an essential prerequisite for rising into the higher classes throughout the Islamic world, both for Muslims and non-Muslims. For example, Maimonides , the Andalusi Jewish philosopher, authored works in Judeo-Arabic —Arabic written in Hebrew script . Ibn Jinni of Mosul , a pioneer in phonology , wrote prolifically in the 10th century on Arabic morphology and phonology in works such as Kitāb Al-Munṣif , Kitāb Al-Muḥtasab , and Kitāb Al-Khaṣāʾiṣ [ ar ] . Ibn Mada' of Cordoba (1116–1196) realized
8515-439: The Champions League victory included wins over European giants Bayern Munich, who were defeated 4–1 on aggregate, and Real Madrid, who suffered a 1–5 aggregate loss at the hands of City. The following season saw considerably less success for the Blues, as they won the UEFA Super Cup and FIFA Club World Cup for the first time and became the first English men's club to win four consecutive league titles. City also advanced to
8646-460: The City Football Group. Since July 2021, CFG has been managed under Newton Investment and Development LLC, another company wholly owned by Sheikh Mansour. ADUG also have an extensive property portfolio in the United Arab Emirates and abroad. Aside from Manchester City, ADUG have amassed investments totalling nearly £1 billion in Manchester , mainly in property and higher education sectors. Aside from purchasing assets for their own control, ADUG signed
8777-402: The City of Manchester Stadium, the club's average attendances have been in the top six in England, usually in excess of 40,000. Even in the late 1990s, when City were relegated twice in three seasons and playing in the third tier of English football (then the Second Division , now the EFL League One ), home attendances were in the region of 30,000, compared to an average of fewer than 8,000 for
8908-544: The First Division and four different permanent managers, Lee resigned from his role as chairman midway through the 1998 season, although remained as a shareholder, as City fell to the lowest point in their history, becoming the second ever European trophy winners to be relegated to their country's third-tier league after 1. FC Magdeburg of Germany. After relegation, the club underwent off-the-field upheaval, with new chairman David Bernstein introducing greater fiscal discipline. Under manager Joe Royle , City were promoted at
9039-422: The Manchester coat of arms was included as a small monochrome logo in the numbers on the back of players' shirts. A new club badge was adopted in 1997, as a result of the previous badge being ineligible for registration as a trademark. This badge was based on the arms of the city of Manchester , and consisted of a shield in front of a golden eagle . The eagle is an old heraldic symbol of the city of Manchester;
9170-412: The Middle East and North Africa have become a badge of sophistication and modernity and ... feigning, or asserting, weakness or lack of facility in Arabic is sometimes paraded as a sign of status, class, and perversely, even education through a mélange of code-switching practises." Arabic has been taught worldwide in many elementary and secondary schools, especially Muslim schools. Universities around
9301-411: The Premier League announced its own investigation of the allegations levied against Manchester City, charging the club with 115 breaches of its FFP rules up to the 2017–18 season. On 24 November 2024 in the 2024-25 season , City lost 0-4 to Tottenham Hotspur that marked the end of their 52-game unbeaten streak at home. It was the Citizen's first home defeat since November 2022 when Brentford claimed
9432-531: The Premier League in 2012 , both their first since the 1960s, followed by another league title in 2014 . Under the management of Pep Guardiola , Manchester City won the Premier League in 2018 , becoming the only team in the competition history to attain 100 points in a single season. In 2018–19 , they won four trophies , completing an unprecedented sweep of all domestic titles in England and becoming
9563-690: The Qur'an is referred to by linguists as "Quranic Arabic", as distinct from its codification soon thereafter into " Classical Arabic ". In late pre-Islamic times, a transdialectal and transcommunal variety of Arabic emerged in the Hejaz , which continued living its parallel life after literary Arabic had been institutionally standardized in the 2nd and 3rd century of the Hijra , most strongly in Judeo-Christian texts, keeping alive ancient features eliminated from
9694-576: The Romance languages. Also, while it is comprehensible to people from the Maghreb , a linguistically innovative variety such as Moroccan Arabic is essentially incomprehensible to Arabs from the Mashriq , much as French is incomprehensible to Spanish or Italian speakers but relatively easily learned by them. This suggests that the spoken varieties may linguistically be considered separate languages. With
9825-495: The change in ownership but was originally retained by the new board – was replaced as manager by Roberto Mancini . City finished the season in fifth position in the Premier League , narrowly missing out on a place in the Champions League but qualifying for the UEFA Europa League . Continued investment in players followed in successive seasons, and results began to match the upturn in player quality. City reached
9956-470: The close 2003–04 season , the club moved to the new City of Manchester Stadium . The first four seasons at the stadium all resulted in mid-table finishes. Former England manager Sven-Göran Eriksson became the club's first foreign manager when appointed in 2007 . After a bright start, performances faded in the second half of the season, and Eriksson was sacked on 2 June 2008; he was replaced by Mark Hughes two days later. By 2008, Manchester City were in
10087-403: The club Al-Fahim was removed from his role to be replaced by Khaldoon al-Mubarak , who remains in position to the present day. In 2011, Manchester City qualified for the Champions League and won the FA Cup , providing the club their first success in over three decades following ADUG's support. In 2012, the club won the Premier League , their first league title in forty-four years. Following
10218-401: The club being the only reigning English champions ever to be relegated (in 1938 ), the only team to score and concede over 100 goals in the same season ( 1957–58 ), or the more recent example where Manchester City were the only team to beat Chelsea in the latter's record-breaking 2004–05 Premier League season , yet in the same season City were knocked out of the FA Cup by Oldham Athletic ,
10349-437: The club won the 2001–02 First Division championship , breaking club records for the number of points gained and goals scored in a single season in the process. The 2002–03 season was the last at Maine Road and included a 3–1 derby victory over rivals Manchester United, ending a 13-year run without a derby win. Additionally, City qualified for European competition for the first time in 25 years via UEFA fair play ranking . In
10480-551: The club's home colours are unclear, but there is evidence that the club has worn blue since 1892 or earlier. A booklet entitled Famous Football Clubs – Manchester City published in the 1940s indicates that West Gorton (St. Marks) originally played in scarlet and black, and reports dating from 1884 describe the team wearing black jerseys bearing a white cross, showing the club's origins as a church side. The infrequent yet recurrent use of red and black away colours comes from former assistant manager Malcolm Allison 's belief that adopting
10611-421: The colours of AC Milan would inspire City to glory. Allison's theory seemingly took effect, with City winning the 1969 FA Cup final , 1970 League Cup final , and 1970 Cup Winners' Cup final in red and black stripes as opposed to the club's home kit of sky blue. City had previously worn three other badges on their shirts, prior to their current badge being implemented in 2016. The first, introduced in 1970,
10742-574: The conversion of Semitic mimation to nunation in the singular. It is best reassessed as a separate language on the Central Semitic dialect continuum. It was also thought that Old Arabic coexisted alongside—and then gradually displaced— epigraphic Ancient North Arabian (ANA), which was theorized to have been the regional tongue for many centuries. ANA, despite its name, was considered a very distinct language, and mutually unintelligible, from "Arabic". Scholars named its variant dialects after
10873-494: The division. Research carried out by Manchester City in 2005 estimated a fanbase of 886,000 in the United Kingdom and a total in excess of 2 million worldwide, although since the purchase of the club by Sheikh Mansour, and City's recent achievements, that figure has since ballooned to many times that size. Manchester City's officially recognised supporters club is the Manchester City F.C. Supporters Club (1949), formed by
11004-422: The eagle and shield were the three stars, added for decorative purposes. On 15 October 2015, following years of criticism from the fans over the design of the 1997 badge, the club announced they intended to carry out a fan consultation on whether to discontinue the current badge and institute a new design. After the consultation, the club announced in late November 2015 the badge would be replaced in due course by
11135-523: The early 1960s but as travel became easier, and the cost of entry to matches rose, watching both teams became unusual and the rivalry intensified. A common stereotype is that City fans come from Manchester proper, while United fans come from elsewhere. A 2002 report by a researcher at Manchester Metropolitan University found that while it was true that a higher proportion of City season ticket holders came from Manchester postcode areas (40% compared to United's 29%), there were more United season ticket holders,
11266-587: The emergence of Central Semitic languages, particularly in grammar. Innovations of the Central Semitic languages—all maintained in Arabic—include: There are several features which Classical Arabic, the modern Arabic varieties, as well as the Safaitic and Hismaic inscriptions share which are unattested in any other Central Semitic language variety, including the Dadanitic and Taymanitic languages of
11397-728: The eve of the conquests: Northern and Central (Al-Jallad 2009). The modern dialects emerged from a new contact situation produced following the conquests. Instead of the emergence of a single or multiple koines, the dialects contain several sedimentary layers of borrowed and areal features, which they absorbed at different points in their linguistic histories. According to Veersteegh and Bickerton, colloquial Arabic dialects arose from pidginized Arabic formed from contact between Arabs and conquered peoples. Pidginization and subsequent creolization among Arabs and arabized peoples could explain relative morphological and phonological simplicity of vernacular Arabic compared to Classical and MSA. In around
11528-607: The fact that they participate in the innovations common to all forms of Arabic. The earliest attestation of continuous Arabic text in an ancestor of the modern Arabic script are three lines of poetry by a man named Garm(')allāhe found in En Avdat, Israel , and dated to around 125 CE. This is followed by the Namara inscription , an epitaph of the Lakhmid king Imru' al-Qays bar 'Amro, dating to 328 CE, found at Namaraa, Syria. From
11659-499: The final day of the season with a 4–3 victory at Newcastle United. Further trophies followed: City won the FA Cup in 1969 and a year later triumphed in the European Cup Winners' Cup , defeating Górnik Zabrze 2–1 in the 1970 final . This was the club's only European honour until their triumph in the 2022–23 UEFA Champions League . The Blues also won the League Cup that year, becoming the second English team to win
11790-399: The first English men's team to win the domestic treble . This was followed by four consecutive Premier League titles in 2020–21 , 2021–22 , 2022–23 and 2023–24 , as well as the club's first Champions League final in 2021 , which they lost to Chelsea . The 2022–23 season saw Manchester City win their maiden European Cup and complete the continental treble in the process, becoming
11921-464: The first attempt, achieved in dramatic fashion in the Second Division play-off final against Gillingham . A second successive promotion saw City return to the top division, but this proved to have been a step too far for the recovering club, and in 2001 City were relegated once more. Kevin Keegan replaced Royle as manager in the close season, and achieved an immediate return to the top division as
12052-523: The first season with the current name. Over the course of its history, the club has won ten league titles , seven FA Cups , eight League Cups , seven FA Community Shields , one UEFA Champions League , one European Cup Winners' Cup , one UEFA Super Cup and one FIFA Club World Cup . The club joined the Football League in 1892 , and won their first major honour, the FA Cup , in 1904 . Manchester City had its first major period of success in
12183-425: The first team to win the Premier League on goal difference alone. The following season , City were unable to replicate the previous year's success. After finishing second in the league , eleven points behind Manchester United, and losing the FA Cup final 0–1 to relegated Wigan Athletic , Mancini was sacked. He was replaced by Chilean manager Manuel Pellegrini . In Pellegrini's first year in charge, City won
12314-510: The fourth most useful language for business, after English, Mandarin Chinese , and French. Arabic is written with the Arabic alphabet , an abjad script that is written from right to left . Arabic is usually classified as a Central Semitic language . Linguists still differ as to the best classification of Semitic language sub-groups. The Semitic languages changed between Proto-Semitic and
12445-597: The inclusion of new words into their published standard dictionaries. They also publish old and historical Arabic manuscripts. In 1997, a bureau of Arabization standardization was added to the Educational, Cultural, and Scientific Organization of the Arab League . These academies and organizations have worked toward the Arabization of the sciences, creating terms in Arabic to describe new concepts, toward
12576-613: The language. Software and books with tapes are an important part of Arabic learning, as many of Arabic learners may live in places where there are no academic or Arabic language school classes available. Radio series of Arabic language classes are also provided from some radio stations. A number of websites on the Internet provide online classes for all levels as a means of distance education; most teach Modern Standard Arabic, but some teach regional varieties from numerous countries. The tradition of Arabic lexicography extended for about
12707-407: The late 1960s and early 1970s, winning the league title, FA Cup , League Cup , and European Cup Winners Cup under the management of Joe Mercer and Malcolm Allison . After losing the 1981 FA Cup final , Manchester City went through a period of decline, culminating in relegation to the third tier of English football for the only time in their history in 1998 . They since regained promotion to
12838-604: The late 6th century AD, a relatively uniform intertribal "poetic koine" distinct from the spoken vernaculars developed based on the Bedouin dialects of Najd , probably in connection with the court of al-Ḥīra . During the first Islamic century, the majority of Arabic poets and Arabic-writing persons spoke Arabic as their mother tongue. Their texts, although mainly preserved in far later manuscripts, contain traces of non-standardized Classical Arabic elements in morphology and syntax. Abu al-Aswad al-Du'ali ( c. 603 –689)
12969-420: The latter is taught in formal education settings. However, there have been studies reporting some degree of comprehension of stories told in the standard variety among preschool-aged children. The relation between Modern Standard Arabic and these dialects is sometimes compared to that of Classical Latin and Vulgar Latin vernaculars (which became Romance languages ) in medieval and early modern Europe. MSA
13100-447: The lower percentage being due to United's higher overall number of season ticket holders (27,667 compared to City's 16,481). The report noted that since the compiling of data in 2001, the number of both City and United season ticket holders had risen; expansion of United's ground and City's move to the City of Manchester Stadium have caused season ticket sales to increase further. Over the last few years, Manchester City has also developed
13231-544: The main stand in 1920, and in 1923 the club moved to their new purpose-built stadium at Maine Road in Moss Side . In the 1930s, Manchester City reached two consecutive FA Cup finals, losing to Everton in 1933 , before claiming the Cup by beating Portsmouth in 1934 . During the 1934 run, the club broke the record for the highest home attendance of any club in English football history, as 84,569 fans packed Maine Road for
13362-883: The many national or regional varieties which constitute the everyday spoken language. Colloquial Arabic has many regional variants; geographically distant varieties usually differ enough to be mutually unintelligible , and some linguists consider them distinct languages. However, research indicates a high degree of mutual intelligibility between closely related Arabic variants for native speakers listening to words, sentences, and texts; and between more distantly related dialects in interactional situations. The varieties are typically unwritten. They are often used in informal spoken media, such as soap operas and talk shows , as well as occasionally in certain forms of written media such as poetry and printed advertising. Hassaniya Arabic , Maltese , and Cypriot Arabic are only varieties of modern Arabic to have acquired official recognition. Hassaniya
13493-598: The members of the Manchester City Official Supporters Club have voted by ballot to choose the player on the team they feel is the most worthy of recognition for his performances during that season. The following table lists the recipients of this award since 2000. Sources: The following former Manchester City players and managers have been inducted into the Manchester City F.C. Hall of Fame , and are listed according to
13624-782: The need for a lexical injection in Arabic, to suit concepts of the industrial and post-industrial age (such as sayyārah سَيَّارَة 'automobile' or bākhirah باخِرة 'steamship'). In response, a number of Arabic academies modeled after the Académie française were established with the aim of developing standardized additions to the Arabic lexicon to suit these transformations, first in Damascus (1919), then in Cairo (1932), Baghdad (1948), Rabat (1960), Amman (1977), Khartum [ ar ] (1993), and Tunis (1993). They review language development, monitor new words and approve
13755-424: The one whose sound is heard but whose person remains unseen. Now the term al-hatif is used for a telephone. Therefore, the process of tawleed can express the needs of modern civilization in a manner that would appear to be originally Arabic. In the case of Arabic, educated Arabs of any nationality can be assumed to speak both their school-taught Standard Arabic as well as their native dialects, which depending on
13886-549: The overhaul of Arabic grammar first proposed by Al-Jahiz 200 years prior. The Maghrebi lexicographer Ibn Manzur compiled Lisān al-ʿArab ( لسان العرب , "Tongue of Arabs"), a major reference dictionary of Arabic, in 1290. Charles Ferguson 's koine theory claims that the modern Arabic dialects collectively descend from a single military koine that sprang up during the Islamic conquests; this view has been challenged in recent times. Ahmad al-Jallad proposes that there were at least two considerably distinct types of Arabic on
14017-804: The payments were actually disguised equity funding that came from the Abu Dhabi United Group (ADUG), owned by Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan , the vice president of the UAE. According to the report, during UEFA disciplinary hearing, the Manchester City’s lawyer named the unknown person as Jaber Mohamed, claiming that he is a businessman providing financial and brokering services in the UAE. Arabic language Arabic (endonym: اَلْعَرَبِيَّةُ , romanized : al-ʿarabiyyah , pronounced [al ʕaraˈbijːa] , or عَرَبِيّ , ʿarabīy , pronounced [ˈʕarabiː] or [ʕaraˈbij] )
14148-410: The region may be mutually unintelligible. Some of these dialects can be considered to constitute separate languages which may have "sub-dialects" of their own. When educated Arabs of different dialects engage in conversation (for example, a Moroccan speaking with a Lebanese), many speakers code-switch back and forth between the dialectal and standard varieties of the language, sometimes even within
14279-458: The same sentence. The issue of whether Arabic is one language or many languages is politically charged, in the same way it is for the varieties of Chinese , Hindi and Urdu , Serbian and Croatian , Scots and English, etc. In contrast to speakers of Hindi and Urdu who claim they cannot understand each other even when they can, speakers of the varieties of Arabic will claim they can all understand each other even when they cannot. While there
14410-617: The second English club to do so. The club is ranked first in the UEFA coefficient standings as of 2023. Manchester City topped the Deloitte Football Money League at the end of the 2021–22 season, making it the football club with the highest revenue in the world, approximated at € 731 million. In 2022, Forbes estimated the club was the sixth-most valuable in the world, worth $ 4.250 billion. Manchester City are owned by City Football Group Limited ,
14541-458: The sole example of Medieval linguist Abu Hayyan al-Gharnati – who, while a scholar of the Arabic language, was not ethnically Arab – Medieval scholars of the Arabic language made no efforts at studying comparative linguistics, considering all other languages inferior. In modern times, the educated upper classes in the Arab world have taken a nearly opposite view. Yasir Suleiman wrote in 2011 that "studying and knowing English or French in most of
14672-420: The space of four games, while City began a run of successive wins which saw both teams level on points with two games to go. Despite the Blues only needing a home win against Queens Park Rangers , a team in the relegation zone, they fell 1–2 behind by the end of normal time. However, two goals in injury time – the second by Sergio Agüero in the fourth added minute – settled the title in City's favour, making them
14803-563: The standardization of these new terms throughout the Arabic-speaking world, and toward the development of Arabic as a world language . This gave rise to what Western scholars call Modern Standard Arabic. From the 1950s, Arabization became a postcolonial nationalist policy in countries such as Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, and Sudan. Arabic usually refers to Standard Arabic, which Western linguists divide into Classical Arabic and Modern Standard Arabic. It could also refer to any of
14934-435: The substitutes bench for the first team. Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules . Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality. Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules . Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality. Since 2003, Manchester City have not issued the squad number 23. It was retired in memory of Marc-Vivien Foé , who
15065-541: The success of the Manchester club, ADUG began investment into other football clubs. After founding the MLS side New York City and purchasing the A-League franchise Melbourne Heart (shortly afterwards renamed Melbourne City), it was deemed necessary to create a new infrastructure to manage the various worldwide footballing ventures, and to keep them separate from non-footballing business. For this purpose, City Football Group
15196-513: The summer of 1965, the management team of Joe Mercer and Malcolm Allison was appointed. In the first season under Mercer, Manchester City won the Second Division title and made important signings in Mike Summerbee and Colin Bell . Two seasons later, in 1967–68 , City claimed the league championship for the second time, beating their close neighbours Manchester United to the title on
15327-510: The takeover - a larger-than-life figure often described as the " Donald Trump of Abu Dhabi". On completion of the takeover, Al-Fahim generated considerable attention in the footballing world with promises of grandiose spending plans to capture the world's greatest footballing talents. Although he did bring in the Brazilian Robinho from Real Madrid on the same day on which the takeover was agreed, one week after ADUG took control of
15458-409: The team on the pitch when the club captain is not playing or not available. Some players have been made captain on a one-off basis to celebrate or commemorate an event, e.g. Oleksandr Zinchenko captained the team in their 2021–22 FA Cup fifth round tie at Peterborough United in support of his country during the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine . Each season since the end of the 1966–67 season ,
15589-589: The third place, thereby securing qualification directly into the Champions League group stage. Strong performances continued to follow in the 2011–12 season , including a 5–1 victory over Tottenham at White Hart Lane and a record-equalling 6–1 win over Manchester United at Old Trafford , but a poor run of form in the second half of the season left City in second place, eight points behind United with only six games left to play. At this point, United suffered their own loss of form, dropping eight points in
15720-411: The title, recording 99 points (the second-highest Premier League total ever after Manchester City's 100 in 2017–18 ) to finish 18 points above runners-up City. The Blues then regained the title in 2020–21 and outgunned Liverpool in another closely-fought title race in 2021–22 , to finish with 93 points to Liverpool's 92. The success of the two teams in the 2010s and 2020s has led to the development of
15851-403: The top tier in 2001–02 and have remained a fixture in the Premier League since 2002–03 . Manchester City received considerable financial investment both in playing staff and facilities following its takeover by Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan through the Abu Dhabi United Group in August 2008. This started a new era of unprecedented success, with the club winning the FA Cup in 2011 and
15982-501: The towns where the inscriptions were discovered (Dadanitic, Taymanitic, Hismaic, Safaitic). However, most arguments for a single ANA language or language family were based on the shape of the definite article, a prefixed h-. It has been argued that the h- is an archaism and not a shared innovation, and thus unsuitable for language classification, rendering the hypothesis of an ANA language family untenable. Safaitic and Hismaic, previously considered ANA, should be considered Old Arabic due to
16113-445: The way. This would prove to be the start of a period of unprecedented success for Manchester City under Guardiola. Between the 2017–18 and 2023–24 Premier League seasons, City won six out of possible seven league titles, only finishing second behind Liverpool in the 2019–20 season . Guardiola also guided the Blues to silverware in domestic cup competitions, highlighted by four consecutive League Cup triumphs in 2018– 2021 . During
16244-451: The world have classes that teach Arabic as part of their foreign languages , Middle Eastern studies , and religious studies courses. Arabic language schools exist to assist students to learn Arabic outside the academic world. There are many Arabic language schools in the Arab world and other Muslim countries. Because the Quran is written in Arabic and all Islamic terms are in Arabic, millions of Muslims (both Arab and non-Arab) study
16375-598: The year of their induction: The following former Manchester City players and managers have been inducted into the English Football Hall of Fame (a.k.a. the National Football Museum Hall of Fame ), and are listed according to the year of their induction within the various categories: Last updated: 21 July 2021. Source: list of NFM Hall of Fame inductees The following former Manchester City players have been inducted into
16506-415: Was based on designs which had been used on official club documentation since the mid-1960s. It consisted of a circular badge which used the same shield as the present badge (including a ship, based on the City of Manchester coat of arms ), inside a circle bearing the name of the club. In 1972, this was replaced by a variation which replaced the lower half of the shield with the red rose of Lancashire. In 1976,
16637-494: Was confirmed to become Manchester City's new manager on 1 February 2016, with the announcement having been made several months before Manuel Pellegrini left his position. Guardiola's first season in Manchester would end trophyless, with the Blues placing third in the league standings, but the following season proved far more successful, as City won the Premier League title with the highest points total in history and broke numerous other club and English league records along
16768-499: Was created in 2014 to oversee all of the teams under their control, acting as holding company not only to the football teams but to several businesses designed to market football services to the wider market. In return, ADUG became the holding company for CFG. ADUG have diluted their shareholding the City Football Group on two occasions in 2015 and 2019 to the approximate value of £654 million. As of 2020, they own 78% of
16899-582: Was not a huge improvement in performance compared to the previous season despite the influx of money however, with the team finishing tenth , although they did well to reach the quarter-finals of the UEFA Cup . During the summer of 2009, the club took transfer spending to an unprecedented level, with an outlay of over £100 million on players Gareth Barry , Roque Santa Cruz , Kolo Touré , Emmanuel Adebayor , Carlos Tevez , and Joleon Lescott . In December 2009, Mark Hughes – who had been hired shortly before
17030-442: Was on loan to the club from Lyon at the time of his death on the field of play while playing for Cameroon in the 2003 FIFA Confederations Cup . Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules . Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality. This is a list of City's official club captains , who are currently appointed via a vote of players and staff. Other players ( vice-captains ) have led
17161-585: Was only a temporary respite, and following Reid's departure Manchester City's fortunes continued to fade. City were co-founders of the Premier League upon its creation in 1992 , but after finishing ninth in its first season, Peter Swales , club chairman since 1973, was replaced by club legend Francis Lee in February 1994 in a movement supported by fans. Despite this, they endured three years of struggle under Brian Horton and Alan Ball Jr. before being relegated in dramatic fashion in 1996 . After two seasons in
#766233