Liverpool Football Club is a professional football club based in Liverpool, England, that competes in the Premier League, the top tier of English football. Founded in 1892, the club joined the Football League the following year and has played at Anfield since its formation.
Liverpool is the most successful club in English football in terms of major trophies won. Domestically, the club has won nineteen League titles, eight FA Cups, a record nine League Cups and fifteen FA Community Shields. In international competitions, the club has won six European Cups, more than any other English club, three UEFA Cups, four UEFA Super Cups, also English records, and one FIFA Club World Cup. The club established itself as a major force in English and European football in the 1970s and 1980s, when Bill Shankly, Bob Paisley, Joe Fagan and Kenny Dalglish, led the club to a combined eleven League titles, several domestic cups and four European Cups. After a relatively fallow period, Liverpool won further European Cups under Rafael Benítez in 2005 and Jürgen Klopp in 2019 and won their first domestic league title in the Premier League era in 2020.
Liverpool is one of the most widely supported clubs in the world, as well as one of the most valuable. The club has long-standing rivalries with inter-city rivals Manchester United and local opposition Everton in the Merseyside derby. In 1964 the team, under Shankly, changed from red shirts and white shorts to an all-red home strip which has been used ever since. The club’s anthem is “You’ll Never Walk Alone”.
The club’s supporters have been involved in two major tragedies. The first was the Heysel Stadium disaster where a collapsing wall at the 1985 European Cup Final in Brussels resulted in 39 deaths. Most of the victims were Italians and Juventus fans fleeing violence in the stands. As a result UEFA issued a five-year ban to all other English teams, and six for Liverpool, from European competition. The second was the Hillsborough disaster in 1989, where 97 Liverpool supporters died in a crush against perimeter fencing. Recommendations of the Taylor Report led to the elimination of fenced standing terraces in favour of all-seater stadiums in the top two tiers of English football. Prolonged campaigning for justice saw further coroners inquests, commissions and independent panels that ultimately exonerated the fans.