AFC Bournemouth is a professional football club based in Kings Park, Boscombe, a suburb of Bournemouth, Dorset, England. The club plays in the Premier League, the top tier of the English football league, following their automatic promotion for the 2022/23 season.
Bournemouth was formed in 1899 as Boscombe before adopting their current name in 1971, and they are nicknamed “The Cherries.”
The club has the Under-21 team and an academy, the youth teams of Bournemouth. The under-21 team is the reserve side for the club, and they compete in the Central League’s Southeast Division.
Ownership
Bournemouth is owned by Maxim Denim, the Russian-born British businessman. In 2011, Maxim became a club co-owner with Eddie Mitchell after buying a 50 percent stake from Jeff Mostyn. In 2013, he became the sole owner of the shareholders after buying out Mitchell entirely.
Stadium
Bournemouth’s home ground is Dean Court, currently known as Vitality Stadium for sponsorship purposes. The stadium is located in Kings Park, Boscombe, a suburb of Bournemouth, Dorset, England, and the Cherries have played their home games there since 1923.
Dean Court has a capacity of 11, 364 and the record attendance was 28 799 in a match against Manchester United in an FA Cup tie in 1957.
Colors, badge, and kit sponsorship
The club’s colors have varied slightly throughout its history. The club has played in red and white stripes, all-red shirts, red with white sleeves, and mostly, since 1990, in red and black stripes. Due to fan demand, the club chose a predominantly red shirt for the 2004/05 and 2005/06 seasons before the stripes returned in the 2006/07 season.
The crest has undergone several changes in the club’s history, but it has always been consistent in its use of red as the dominant color. The current design badge was adopted in 2013, and it’s a shield with black, red, and white colors. The crest has a player’s head and a football, which first appeared in 1972, and the club’s name, AFC Bournemouth, is written in bronze on top of the crest.
The club has had several kit manufacturers and the current manufacturer, Umbro, since 2017. The current shirt sponsor is Dafabet, who took over from MSP Capital in 2022.
Fans and rivalries
Most of the team supporters are local people in Bournemouth and across England. In August 2019, a poll named ‘The League of Love and Hate’ published an article claiming Bournemouth supporters named their neighbors Southampton their biggest rivals, with Portsmouth, Brighton, and Reading following.
Club honors
Bournemouth are one-time winners of the Championship, the League Trophy, and Division Three league. At the same time, they have finished as runners-up once in the League Trophy, the Championship, League One, League Two, Division Four, and Division Three (South).
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