About Portsmouth

Portsmouth Football Club is an English football club based in the city of Portsmouth. The club is nicknamed Pompey, sometimes called 'The Blues', with their fans known as 'The Blue Army'. They play in the Premier League. They have played their home matches at Fratton Park since 1898. Ownership of the club is currently being transferred to the UAE multi billionaire Sulaiman al-Fahim.

On 27th May 2009, ArabianBusiness.com reported that Sulaiman Al-Fahim has signed a deal to take over the club.

Portsmouth have won the FA Cup twice, most recently in 2008. Pompey's main rivals are Southampton, though they are now separated by two divisions.

Club colours

Portsmouth's first ever kit had a shirt that was salmon pink in colour with white shorts and maroon socks. This kit lasted until 1909 when they changed to white shirts with royal blue shorts and socks. This kit lasted just two years before it was changed for blue shirts, white shorts and black socks. This was Portsmouth's home strip up until 1947 when the socks were changed to red; this coincided with the club's most successful period and has remained the favoured colours for majority of the time since. Yellow and more recently gold have also been used as secondary colours on the club's home shirts.[11] For the 2008-09 season Portsmouth's first choice home colours are blue shirts with blue shorts and socks. The club has confirmed it will revert to its traditional strip for the 2009-10 season.

The most frequent away colours used by Portsmouth have been white shirts with royal blue shorts and either royal blue or white socks. The club has had white as either the second or third choice shirt for every season since 1998-99 to date. Other colours that have appeared several times on Portsmouth change kits have been yellow (usually with blue shorts) and red (often combined with black.) Portsmouth have also briefly experimented with salmon pink, orange, navy blue and, perhaps most notably, gold change strips. Since the 2006-07 season the club has used black with a gold trim as its third choice colours.

Club crest

The official emblem contains a gold star and crescent on a blue shield, Portsmouth's adoption of the star and crescent (usually synonymous with Islam) is said to have come from when King Richard I, granted the city "a crescent of gold on a shade of azure, with a blazing star of eight points" which he had taken from the Byzantine Emperor's standard of Governor Isaac Komnenos, after capturing Cyprus. It is one of the most recognisable football crests in English football and is nicknamed 'the smiley crest' because of its similarity to a smiling face.

Throughout its history Portsmouth have tried different variations of the crest before reverting back to the basic gold star and crescent. In the 1950s and 1960s the traditional crest was emblazoned on the shirt in white rather than gold but this was due to white being a cheaper alternative.

Between 1980 and 1989 the club scrapped the original crest and replaced it with a new design. This crest showed a football on top of an anchor (representing the navy) and a sword (representing the army). An interchangeable version included a circular version of the star and crescent crest in place of the football.

The return of the original crest in 1989 only lasted 4 years when it was replaced by the city's coat of arms in 1993. This design was based around the basic star and crescent but was unpopular with many fans who thought it was over elaborate. After only four seasons the original crest was again reinstated and remains to the present day. In time for the 2007 season "Since 1898" was added to the badge underneath the club's name.

On 6 May 2008 Portsmouth FC unveiled a new crest which differs significantly from the old crest. It removes the 'three points' and the 'star and moon' now have a three dimensional look. The 'moon' also has more diameter and looks quite like the city's Coat of Arms.