Star (football crest)

In association football, some national and club sides include one or more stars as part of (or beside) the crest appearing on their shirt, to represent important trophies the team has previously won. Sometimes this is a unilateral decision by the team concerned rather than a privilege earned and sanctioned by any governing body.

Note that some clubs have stars on their crests that do not signify any particular titles. The crest of Peñarol of Uruguay has 11 stars for the 11 players, [] and a twelfth is to be added for the supporters, the "12th Man".Fact|date=September 2007 Manchester City's crest has three stars, to give it a "more continental feel" [From the official 1997 press release at the crest's introduction; quoted in cite web |url=http://www.uit.no/mancity/club/history.html |title=Manchester City: OFFICIALS AND HISTORY |first=Svenn |last=Hanssen |accessdate=2007-01-15.] . Sivasspor of Turkey also has three stars on their crest. They do not represent any championships either.

tandardised significance

The first team to adopt a star was Juventus, who added one above their crest in 1958 to represent their tenth Serie A title. This was an extension of the existing convention by which the reigning champions are entitled to display the scudetto on their shirts for the following season. The star was later formally adopted as a symbol for ten titles. A silver star can be used for 10 Coppa Italia titles. No team has yet achieved that as of 2008, though A.S. Roma and Juventus have won 9.

The Turkish league introduced a similar scheme in 2000, with one star per five titles.

Football in Germany has two official star systems operating in parallel. In 2004, the DFL, which governs the Bundesliga (the top 2 divisions), introduced "Verdiente Meistervereine" (roughly "distinguished champion clubs"). This has a sliding scale of 1, 2, 3, and 4 stars for 3, 5, 10, and 20 titles.] It includes only Bundesliga titles, excluding titles from before the formation of the Bundesliga in 1963, and from the former East German League. Dynamo Berlin (playing in the fourth level) unilaterally began wearing three unapproved stars for its ten East German titles. [] In November 2005, the DFB, which governs non-Bundesliga football, allowed former champions playing outside the Bundesliga to display a single star inscribed with the number of titles [ [http://www.dfb.de/fileadmin/Assets/pdf/durchfuehrungsbestimmung.pdf DFB clothing instructions, page 54] de icon] . In 2007, Dynamo Berlin switched to a single approved star inscribed with the number 10.

Major League Soccer's previously informal system, one star per MLS Cup title, was standardised in 2006, with the exception that defending champions will wear the MLS Scudetto, like the Serie A system, for one season before adding a new star.

Since 2006, all Swedish football clubs that have won ten or more Swedish championships (except IFK Norrköping) have added a star above their crest, one star symbolizing ten or more won championships.

The same system has applied in the Dutch Eredivisie from the 2007-08 season onwards. [cite web |url=http://www.eredivisie.nl/subpage.aspx?l1=1637&subaction=details&newsid=186&type=0 |publisher=Eredivisie |title=Kampioenssterren wijzen op historische roem ("Champions' stars show past glories")|date=11 May 2007 |accessdate=2007-05-16 |language=Dutch] This innovation was suggested by PSV, after the club won its twentieth title in 2007. [cite web |url=http://english.psv.nl/web/show/id=58980/contentid=20826 |title=Reigning champions PSV display two stars on their shirts |quote=“We have conceived a plan to not only introduce these two stars on the championship logo, but on the shirts as well”, explained PSV Manager Match Organisation Ron Verkerk. “We have made a proposal to the KNVB, the Royal Dutch Football Association and the ECV, the Association of Eredivisie clubs, and they have both independently responded enthusiastically.” |publisher=PSV Eindhoven |date=2 May 2007 |accessdate=2005-05-16] Ajax and PSV will have the right to wear two stars, since they have won the league 29 and 21 times respectively, while Feyenoord and HVV Den Haag can add one for their 14 and 10 titles.

In the Romanian first league, Steaua uses 2 stars above their logo since they won their 20th title. Since then Dinamo added a star for the 18 championships they won.

Ad hoc adoptions

Brazil added three stars above their crest after winning their third World Cup in 1970. Italy did likewise in 1982. All world champions have since followed suit. Uruguay display four stars, regarding their triumphs in the 1924 and 1928 Olympics as equivalent to their later World Cup wins, as there was no World Cup at the time.

More recently, club teams have added stars either upon winning a landmark trophy, or in response to a rival team's having added stars. Manchester United wore two stars in their UEFA Champions League matches in 1999-2000, to celebrate their second victory in the competition the preceding season. Liverpool F.C. likewise wore four stars in 2001-02, their first campaign in the event since the Heysel Stadium disaster in 1985. They wore five stars in the competition in 2005-06 after their fifth victory. Instead of stars, UEFA introduced the UEFA badge of honour in 2003, currently worn by five teams who have won the Champions League either five times or more in total, or three times in a row.

In women's football, the emerging ad hoc standard is to wear stars on the sleeve instead of above the crest. Two of the three teams that have won the FIFA Women's World Cup to date — Norway and Germany — use this practice, as did the only other Women's World Cup winners, the USA, until moving the stars to the back collar in 2007.

List

Excluding the temporary stars, the following teams have chosen to add stars to their shirts:

National teams

Men

References