This article lists English association football clubs whose men's sides have won competitive honours run by official governing bodies. Friendly competitions and matches organized between clubs are not included. The football associations FIFA and UEFA run international and European competitions; while The Football Association, and its mostly self-governing subsidiary bodies the English Football League and Premier League, run national competitions.
England's first competition organised by a national body, the FA Cup, began in the 1871–72 season, making it one of the oldest football competitions in the world.[1][2] Arsenal hold the record number of wins, with 14.[3] League football began in the next decade with the founding of The Football League in 1888–89. The name First Division was adopted in 1892, when The Football League gained a second division. The First Division remained the highest division of the English league system until 1992, when the Premier League was founded. Manchester United have won the most top division titles overall, with 20.[4] The English equivalent of the super cup began in 1898 with the inauguration of the Sheriff of London Charity Shield, pitting the best professional and amateur sides of the year against each other.[5] The trophy would develop into the FA Charity Shield in 1908, which was later renamed the FA Community Shield in 2002. Manchester United also hold the record here, with 21 wins.[5] The Football League created its own knockout competition in 1960, the League Cup. Its current record is ten wins, held by Liverpool. The Anglo-Italian League Cup was created in 1969 to match English cup winners against the winners of the Coppa Italia, but was permanently disbanded in 1976.[6] In 1985, the Full Members' Cup and Football League Super Cup were created as substitutes for UEFA competitions after UEFA banned English clubs for a number of years following the Heysel Stadium disaster.[7][8] They finished in 1992 and 1986, respectively. The Football League Centenary Trophy marked The Football League's 100th birthday, in the 1988–89 season.[9]
The European governing body UEFA was founded in 1954, and created their first and most prestigious competition, the European Cup, the next year. It was expanded and renamed in 1992 as the UEFA Champions League. Liverpool hold the English record for the most wins, with six.[10] Parallel to UEFA, various officials created the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup in 1955, but the competition was disbanded when UEFA created a replacement tournament, the UEFA Cup, in 1971 (renamed the UEFA Europa League in 2009).[11] The English record for the most UEFA Cup/Europa League wins is three, also held by Liverpool. Another competition absorbed into the UEFA Cup, in 1999, was the UEFA Cup Winners' Cup, which was created in 1960 and featured the winners of national knockout competitions.[12] The winners of this competition played the European Cup winners in the UEFA Super Cup, starting in 1972 (recognised by UEFA in 1973), which now features the winners of the Champions League and Europa League.[13] Liverpool hold the English record for the most wins in the UEFA Super Cup, with four.[14] The International Football Cup, also known as the UEFA Intertoto Cup, was a competition for clubs not participating in the European Cup, UEFA Cup or Cup Winners' Cup. The tournament commenced in 1961, but UEFA officially recognised it only in 1995, and discontinued it in 2008, with the Europa League expanded to accommodate Intertoto Cup clubs.[15] UEFA and CONMEBOL also created an intercontinental competition in 1960, the Intercontinental Cup, featuring continental champions from both associations. In 2000, the international governing body FIFA created the FIFA Club World Cup and in 2004 the Intercontinental Cup was merged into it. Manchester United are the only English club to have won the Intercontinental Cup, while United, Liverpool, Chelsea and Manchester City are the only English teams to have lifted the Club World Cup.[16][17]
Lower down in the hierarchy of English football are many other competitions, not included in the tables on this page. These include tournaments run by the above national governing bodies, but organised for clubs ineligible for higher competitions. Examples include the EFL Trophy. Regional competitions are organised by County Football Associations; in the years when league football was unavailable or only available to northern and midlands clubs, county competitions coexisted with the FA Cup as the main tournaments for clubs. Nowadays, county cups are contested by lower or regional division teams and those that still participate generally field youth or reserve sides.
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