Hapoel Haifa

Hapoel Haifa Football Club (Hebrew: מועדון הכדורגל הפועל חיפה‎, Moadon HaKaduregel Hapoel Haifa) is an Israeli football club located in Haifa. The club won one championship (1998–99) and 4 Israeli cups (1962–63, 1965–66 and 1973–74, 2017–18). The team is also known as "The Sharks". The club's home is the Sammy Ofer Stadium in Haifa, in which they have played since their departure from Kiryat Eliezer Stadium in 2014 and Kiryat Haim's Thomas D'Alesandro Stadium in 1955. The colours of the team's home kit are red throughout. The away colours are white shirts, and black shorts and socks.

History

The Early years

The beginning of the club was in a local organization founded in Haifa in 1924. This organization included several branches related to sports, in addition to branches related to worker movements and the Histadrut. Their goal was to found the first ever labor football club in Palestine, like those around the world. The most acceptable version about the club's establishment says that during Passover, on April 24, 1924, the establishment meeting took place, in a house at the Hadar Neighborhood in Haifa, including 36 representatives of the different authorities. The meeting was led by Yehoshua Sherpstein and Yair Aharony.

On May 1, 1924, Labor Day, was the first match, in which Hapoel Haifa beat 3–1 the train workers of Haifa. In the first years of the club it played mainly friendly matches against different teams from Palestine, Europe, and the Middle East (Since the Football Association was yet to be established, there were no formal matches). At the beginning Hapoel Haifa was included under the Maccabi union, since it was the only union at that time. Two years later the club decided to leave Maccabi, and was among the founders of the new union, Hapoel.

In 1928 the Israel Football Association (IFA) was founded, and formal matches were scheduled: In the first 4 years only cup matches, and afterwards league matches were added. During these years Hapoel Haifa did

This page also has a version in other languages :  Хапоэль (Хайфа) (russian)