Calcio Catania is an Italian football club based in the city of Catania in Sicily. They currently feature in the Italian Serie A but have endured Serie B for most of their history and have managed just 5 seasons in the Italian top flight.

Catania owe their origins to the English cargo ships who brought workers and football into Sicily. On June 19,1908 Italian film director Gaetano Ventimiglia and Francesco Sturzo d’Aldobrando formed the football club AS Educazione Fisica Po Patria. Two years fast forward and the club renamed the club as Unione Sportivo Catanese and during the 1952-1943 the club was rechristened to Associazione Calcio Fascista Catania briefly.

Country Italy Italy
City Catania
Founded 1908
Website calciocatania.it

At the end of the 1945-1946 season Club Calcio Catania sprung out of the mergence of Catanese and Virtus Catania and gained promotion to the Italian Serie B for the 1949-1950 season after spending three seasons in the Serie C.

Catania’s best years in their history arrived during the 1950s and the 1960s. They gained promotion to the Serie A for the first time ever in their history when they won the Serie B in the 1953-1954 season and then finished 12th in their maiden 1955-1956 Serie A season but were relegated due to financial scam.

Catania played the 1960-1961 season in the Italian Serie A and played there until 1966. Since then they have endured mixed fortunes and in the 1980s even played in the Serie C1.

Catania played again in the Italian Serie A in the 2006-2007 season but were involved in a huge controversy when on February 2,2007 during a Silician derby with Palermo, Filipp Raciti, a policeman, was killed during violence involving the Catania ultras outside the stadium.

But Catania held on and also survived the 2007-2008 season in the Serie A.

Catania play their home matches at the Stadio Angelo Massimio in Catania which can hold 23,420 people. The club is nicknamed as the Rossazzurri (Red and Light blues), Gli Elefanti (The Elephants) and Etnei Etneans).

Catania foster massive rivalry with Sicilian rivals Palermo and Cagliari.