A.C. Milan History
The club was founded as a cricket club in 1899 by British expatriates Alfred Edwards and Herbert Kilpin, who came from the British city of Nottingham. In honor of its origins, the club has retained the English spelling of its city's name, instead of changing it to the Italian Milano (though it was forced to do it during the fascist regime, like Genoa and Inter); it should be noted that the Italian pronunciation is actually MEE-lan, coming from the local dialect. AC Milan won their first Italian championship title in 1901, and then again in 1906 and 1907.
In 1908 the club experienced a split caused by internal disagreements over the signing of foreign players, which led to the forming of another Milan-based team, F.C. Internazionale Milano. Following these events, AC Milan did not manage to win a single domestic title until 1950-51. In 1963 they ensured their first continental title, winning European Cup beating S.L. Benfica in the final. This success was repeated in 1969, and followed by an Intercontinental Cup title the same year. Following retirement of Gianni Rivera, Milan started a declining period, during which they were involved in the 1980 Totonero scandal and were relegated to Serie B as punishment, for their first time in history. The scandal was centred on a betting syndicate paying players and officials to fix the outcome of matches. AC Milan quickly returned back to Serie A, but returned to Serie B only one year later as they ended in the relegation zone their 1981-82 Serie A campaign.In
1986, entrepreneur Silvio Berlusconi acquired the club, and immediately invested a lot of money in the team, appointing rising coach Arrigo Sacchi at the helm of the rossoneri and signing a Dutch trio of Marco van Basten, Ruud Gullit and Frank Rijkaard. This was the beginning of the most successful time in the club's history, as AC Milan won seven domestic titles, five UEFA Champions League trophies, and three Intercontinental Cups.
More recently, Milan were involved in the 2006 Serie A scandal where five teams were accused of fixing matches by selecting favourable referees. Milan were initially punished with a 15 point deduction and consequently did not qualify for the Champions League. An appeal saw their penalty reduced to 8 points and allowed to retain their 2006-07 Champions League participation, where they won the competition.
