RC Celta de Vigo

History

The club was formed from the ambition of Vigo's teams to achieve more at national level, where Basque sides had been their bête noire in the Spanish Championship. The idea was to merge Real Vigo Sporting and Real Club Fortuna de Vigo into a more powerful team. Manuel de Castro, a sports writer for Faro de Vigo known as "Handicap", began advocating for unification from 1915 with the slogan "Todo por y para Vigo". His movement gained support, and on 22 June 1923 the motion was backed unanimously at the assembly of the Royal Spanish Football Federation in Madrid.

The merger was approved at annual general meetings on 12 July 1923, and at the last general meeting on 10 August the name Club Celta was chosen, referring to an ethnic race linked to Galicia. The first president was Manuel Bárcena de Andrés, Count of Torre Cedeira. The squad of 64 players was managed by Francis Cuggy, and the first match was an 8–2 friendly win over Portuguese side Boavista. In January 1927, Celta won the Copa del Rey Alfonso XIII trophy by defeating English sailors 4–1.

In 1947–48, the club ranked fourth and reached the Copa del Generalísimo final, losing 4–1 to Sevilla FC; striker Pahiño won the Pichichi Trophy that season with 21 goals in 22 games.

Identity

Celta's original crest was a red shield with two stylised letter Cs and the royal crown of Spain, granted because the club received patronage from Alfonso XIII. The shield colour was later changed to sky blue. In 1928, the red cross of Saint James was added, a feature shared with other Galician clubs. During the Spanish Second Republic, the crown and honorific title were removed but later restored. Home colours are sky blue and white, originally a red shirt, black shorts and blue socks, later changed to colours representing the Galician flag. From 1985 to 2016, Celta had the longest-running sponsorship deal in Spanish football with Citroën, whose plant was near Balaídos. In 2016, the sponsor became Estrella Galicia, which had advertised on the back of shirts since 2011. The kit supplier Umbro also had a long-running deal from 1986 to 2010.

Management

Real Club Celta de Vigo, S.A.D. is a sports corporation controlled by Spanish-Mexican businessman Carlos Mouriño. He became the majority owner in May 2006 after purchasing Horacio Gómez’s 39.84% stake, and now holds 67.9% of the club through Grupo Corporativo Ges, S.L. In October 2016, a potential €100 million takeover by the Chinese CITS Group was considered. The club’s president is Marián Mouriño, with Ricardo Barros and Pedro Posada serving as vice presidents. The board includes María José Táboas, Primitivo Ferro, Carmen Avendaño, and José Fernando Rodilla. Other key figures are managing director Antonio Chaves, financial director María José Herbón, and academy director Carlos Hugo García.