Valerenga

Valerenga Fotball (Norwegian pronunciation: [ˈvoːɽɛŋɑ] (listen)) is a Norwegian association football club from Oslo and a part of the multi-sport club Valerengens IF. Founded in 1913, the club is named after the neighbourhood of Valerenga. Valerenga's home ground is Intility Arena, located in Valle-Hovin. Valerenga are five-time league champions and four-time Norwegian Football Cup champions, having last won the league in 2005 and the cup in 2008. The club has a somewhat mythical status due to a history of colorful players, staff and fans.

History

Early days (1913–45)

The history of Valerenga Fotball goes back to Fotballpartiet Spark, which was founded in 1898 by pastor Hans Moller Gasmann. An early mission for Gasmann was to give the local youth social activity and exercise. On a larger scale, the club was part of the movement known as Muscular Christianity. A successor to this football club, Idrettslaget Spring, was founded on 29 July 1913 by a group of teenage factory workers. A year later, the club changed its name to Vaalerengens Idrattsforening. Rooted in the neighborhood of Valerenga on the east end of Oslo, the club would recruit players and supporters from the many workers in the area, in a society then characterized for its low mobility between social strata. Within its first seasons, Valerengen would compete with the major clubs in Oslo at that time; Lyn, Mercantile and Frigg. Where Lyn and Frigg had a strong identity with the academia and the upper classes, Valerengen developed a working class identity.

Valerengens Idrettsforening had mixed success in its first years, but fortunes improved as the 1920s came around and the club secured promotion to the Oslo Championships in 1921. Valerengen won the Oslo Championships four times before a national league (Norgesserien) was established in 1937. In the 1948–49 season, Valerengen finished second.

After this period, Valerengen entered a period of instability, being relegate

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