A.S.D. Casale Foot Ball Club (formerly A.S. Casale Calcio) is an

Italian football Football ( it, calcio ) is the most popular sport in Italy. The Italy national football team is considered to be one of the best national teams in the world. They have won the FIFA World Cup four times (1934, 1938, 1982, 2006), trailing only ...

club, based in Casale Monferrato,

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. The club plays in

Serie D The Serie D () is the top level of semi-professional football in the country. The fourth tier of the Italian league system, the competition sits beneath the third professional league, Serie C. It is administered by the Lega Nazionale Dilettant ...

. The team's nickname ''nerostellati'' (“the starred-blacks”) refers to the team's colours of black with a white star on the chest.

History

When the club was founded in 1909 Casale was at the geographical center of the new footballing movement in Italy.

Genoa Genoa ( ; it, Genova ; lij, Zêna ). is the capital of the Italian region of Liguria and the sixth-largest city in Italy. In 2015, 594,733 people lived within the city's administrative limits. As of the 2011 Italian census, the Province of ...

Pro Vercelli Football Club Pro Vercelli 1892, commonly referred to as Pro Vercelli, is an Italian football club based in Vercelli, Piedmont. The club is mostly renowned as one of the most successful teams in the early football era of Italy, with seven natio ...

Milan Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city h ...

Torino Turin ( , Piedmontese: ; it, Torino ) is a city and an important business and cultural centre in Northern Italy. It is the capital city of Piedmont and of the Metropolitan City of Turin, and was the first Italian capital from 1861 to 1865. T ...

, and Juventus were all leading clubs in the

Italian football league system The Italian football league system, also known as the Italian football pyramid, refers to the hierarchically interconnected league system for association football in Italy. It consists of nine national and regional tournaments, the first three be ...

and Casale soon joined their number. In May 1913 Casale became the first Italian club to defeat an English professional team when they beat

Reading F.C. Reading Football Club ( ) is a professional football club based in Reading, Berkshire, England. The team play in the Championship, the second tier of the English football league system. The club is managed by Paul Ince. Reading are nicknamed ...

2–1. Reading won all the other games on this tour, defeating Genoa,

, Pro Vercelli, and even the Italian national team. In the following season, Casale won their first and only national title. Italian football was then organized on a regional basis and the national championship was divided into three stages. Casale topped the Ligurian-Piedmontese division and proceeded, along with second-placed Genoa, to compete in a division comprising the top northern teams, the others being

Inter Milan Football Club Internazionale Milano, commonly referred to as Internazionale () or simply Inter, and colloquially known as Inter Milan in English-speaking countries, is an Italian professional football club based in Milan, Lombardy. Inter is ...

, Juventus,

Vicenza Vicenza ( , ; ) is a city in northeastern Italy. It is in the Veneto region at the northern base of the ''Monte Berico'', where it straddles the Bacchiglione River. Vicenza is approximately west of Venice and east of Milan. Vicenza is a thr ...

and

Verona Verona ( , ; vec, Verona or ) is a city on the Adige River in Veneto, Italy, with 258,031 inhabitants. It is one of the seven provincial capitals of the region. It is the largest city municipality in the region and the second largest in nor ...

. Having won that division, Casale defeated central-southern champions

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7–1, 0–2 in the two-leg final. After

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, Casale remained in the top division for a couple of decades, representing what had been the cradle of early

. With the development of professionalism, Casale was progressively relegated to lower divisions, 1934 being their last year in

Serie A The Serie A (), also called Serie A TIM for national sponsorship with TIM, is a professional league competition for football clubs located at the top of the Italian football league system and the winner is awarded the Scudetto and the Cop ...

. The club was later refounded twice, in 1993 and 2013, after financial problems. In 2013, it took the current name of Casale Foot Ball Club. A heated rivalry exists between the fans of Casale and Alessandria.

Notable players

:''See also :Casale F.B.C. players'' Five players who appeared in the scudetto-winning team of 1913–14 played in the Italian national team, all making their international debuts between 1912 and 1914: *

Luigi Barbesino Luigi Barbesino (; 1 May 1894 – 20 April 1941) was an Italian association footballer and manager from Casale Monferrato in the region of Piedmont. A midfielder, he was a one club man in the truest sense of the term, spending his eight playin ...

Giovanni Gallina Giovanni Gallina (; 1 January 1892 – 1963) was an Italian footballer who played as a forward. He represented the Italy national football team twice, the first being on 11 January 1914, the occasion of a friendly match against Austria ...

Angelo Mattea Angelo Mattea (; 21 October 1892 – 1960) was an Italian football player and manager from Santhià in the Province of Vercelli. He played club football as a forward or midfielder for several teams in Italy including Casale, which he helped ...

Giuseppe Parodi Giuseppe Parodi (; 17 December 1892 – 1 March 1984) was an Italian footballer who played as a midfielder. He competed for Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Sout ...

Amedeo Varese Amedeo Varese (; 2 July 1890 – 4 January 1969) was an Italian footballer who played as a midfielder. He represented the Italy national football team five times, the first being on 12 January 1913, the occasion of a friendly match against Fr ...

One of Casale's biggest stars, however, was the full back

Umberto Caligaris Umberto Caligaris (; 26 July 1901 – 19 October 1940) was an Italian international footballer who played, normally at left-back, for A.S. Casale and Juventus, before ending his career with Brescia. With Juventus he won an Italian record of fiv ...

whose career with the club ran from 1919 to 1928. During his period with the ''nerostellati'', he made 37 appearances for

Italy national football team The Italy national football team ( it, Nazionale di calcio dell'Italia) has represented Italy in international football since its first match in 1910. The national team is controlled by the Italian Football Federation (FIGC), the governing bo ...

, featuring at the 1924 Summer Olympics and winning a bronze medal at the 1928 Summer Olympics before leaving Casale for Juventus. His total of 59 caps stood as a record for about 40 years.

Eraldo Monzeglio Eraldo Monzeglio (; 5 June 1906 – 3 November 1981) was an Italian association football coach and player, who played as a defender, in the position of full-back. Monzeglio had a highly successful career as a footballer, although he also later ...

, later to represent Italy on numerous occasions, including the

1934 Events January–February * January 1 – The International Telecommunication Union, a specialist agency of the League of Nations, is established. * January 15 – The 8.0 Nepal–Bihar earthquake strikes Nepal and Bihar with a maxi ...

and 1938 World Cups, made his Serie A debut with Casale in 1923–24. The following season, however, he moved to

Bologna Bologna (, , ; egl, label=Emilian language, Emilian, Bulåggna ; lat, Bononia) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in Northern Italy. It is the seventh most populous city in Italy with about 400,000 inhabitants and 1 ...

Honours

National titles

*Winners: 1913–14

Serie B The Serie B (), currently named Serie BKT for sponsorship reasons, is the second-highest division in the Italian football league system after the Serie A. It has been operating for over ninety years since the 1929–30 season. It had been ...

*Winners: 1929–30

Coppa Italia Dilettanti The Coppa Italia Dilettanti ( Italian for: Italian Amateurs Cup) is an annual knock-out competition for teams from the fifth and sixth levels of Italian football: the Eccellenza and the Promozione. All ties except for the final, which is held at t ...

*Winners: 1998–99

Sub-national titles

Serie C The Serie C () is the third-highest division in the Italian football league system after the Serie B and Serie A. The Lega Italiana Calcio Professionistico (Lega Pro) is the governing body that runs the Serie C. The unification of the Lega Pro ...

*Winners: 1937–38 (Girone C) Serie C2 *Winners: 1988–89 (Girone A)

*Winners: 1973–74 (Girone A), 1985–86 (Girone A) *Promoted: 2003–04

Notes

References

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Casale Football clubs in Piedmont and Aosta Valley Association football clubs established in 1909 Italian football First Division clubs Serie A clubs Serie B clubs Serie C clubs Serie D clubs Serie A winning clubs 1909 establishments in Italy