Manchester City and Manchester United are popular Premier League football clubs in Greater Manchester. United's ground is in Old Trafford; Manchester City's home ground is the City of Manchester Stadium in east Manchester. Fixtures between the clubs are referred to as the Manchester Derby.
Manchester United are historically the second most successful football club in England with 67 elite honours won (including three European Cups) and was the first team in England to achieve the Continental treble. Manchester United's revenue was the fifth highest of a football club in the world in the 2022–23 season at €745.8 million. In 2023, Forbes estimated the club was the second most valuable in the world at $6 billion.
Manchester City have won ten domestic league titles, most recently in 2024. Under the management of Pep Guardiola in winning the Premier League in 2018, they became the only Premier League team to attain 100 points in a single season. In 2019, they won four trophies, completing an unprecedented sweep of all domestic trophies in England and is the first English men's team to win the Domestic treble. In 2023, they became the second English team to win the Continental treble. This makes Manchester the only city in Europe to have two continental treble winning teams. Manchester City's revenue was the second highest of a football club in the world in the 2022–23 season at €825.9 million. In 2023, Forbes estimated the club was the fifth most valuable in the world at $4.99 billion.
Manchester has hosted every major domestic, continental and international football competition, including the World Cup in 1966, the European Championship in 1996, Olympic Football in 2012, the 2003 UEFA Champions League Final, the 2008 UEFA Cup Final, 1893, 1911, 1915 and 1970 FA Cup Finals and 1977, 1978 and 1984 Football League Cup Final.
Lancashire County Cricket Club, formed in 1865 to replace Manchester Cricket Club, play at Old Trafford cricket ground.
Manchester has competed twice to host the Olympic Games, being beaten into fourth place by Atlanta in 1996 and coming third to Sydney in 2000. Manchester hosted the 2002 Commonwealth Games with many sporting facilities being built for them, including the City of Manchester Stadium, the Manchester Velodrome, the National Squash Centre and the Manchester Aquatics Centre.
Football
Two Premier League football clubs, Manchester United and Manchester City, bear the city's name. Manchester City's home ground, the City of Manchester Stadium, is two miles outside Manchester city centre in east Manchester and Manchester United's, Old Trafford, the largest club football ground in the United Kingdom, on the west side two miles from the city centre.
Both City and United, as of 2001, had a highly localised fanbase with the majority of season ticket holding fans in the outer postal areas (BL, OL, SK, and WA) of Greater Manchester and within other counties of the North-westThe other counties are Lancashire, Cheshire, Merseyside and Cumbria. Also studied were the Stadium Neighbourhoods, i.e. M14 postal district for City and M16 for United. The M postal area is much more extensive than the City of Manchester. Only a fraction of both clubs' respective season ticket subscribers came from within the central areas of the City of Manchester. The Manchester postal area includes the (strongly United supporting) City of Salford but also Prestwich and Whitefield in Bury (with one of the largest City supporters clubs). This research was conducted before City moved to the larger (48,000 capacity) City of Manchester Stadium, and before the expansion of United's Old Trafford stadium which now accommodates 76,000 meaning that the situation will have changed in the period since it was written.
Further research, published in 2008, has identified that the Manchester region is split with City's support predominantly coming in the south and east of Greater Manchester and the surrounding area and United's in the west. United's nationwide and international support far exceeds that of City. Polls done in the local media suggest that the support of both clubs is split nearly 50/50 within the city and United edging out City with a small majority in all of Greater Manchester.
Aside from their two Premier League clubs, Manchester's earliest known association football club was Hulme Athenaeum, established in November 1863 with its first secretary being Jonathan Nall.James, Gary & Day, Dave (2014) The Emergence of an Association Football Culture in Manchester 1840–1884, Sport in History, Vol 34, Issue 1, pp.49-74 http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17460263.2013.873075?src=recsysJames, Gary Manchester's Footballing Pioneers, 1863–1904: A Collective Biography, The International Journal of the History of Sport (2015), Vol 32, no. 9, pp.1143-1159 http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/09523367.2015.1055727?src=recsys Manchester hosted the first meeting of representatives from the home nations football associations in 1886, and the International Football Association Board, which makes the rules for the game, was formed following this meeting. FIFA adopted the rules and regulations of football laid out by the IFAB when the organisation formed in 1904. Manchester has remained a regular summit location for IFAB meetings since their formation.
Manchester also hosts several other smaller semi-pro and amateur football clubs, the most notable of which is F.C. United of Manchester, who are based at Broadhurst Park in Moston, an area less than three miles north of the city centre. They play in the 6th tier of English football in the National League North after being promoted from NPL Premier Division.
The Manchester Football League is the official amateur football league of Manchester.
Athletics
The city hosted the 2002 Commonwealth Games, and athletics events took place at the City of Manchester Stadium, which is now home to Manchester City and sometimes referred to as Eastlands. Next to Eastlands lies the Manchester Regional Arena, which has been used for British athletics trials and the annual Paralympic World Cup which has been held in Manchester since 2005.
The city also hosts the annual Great Manchester Run which has been hosted since 2003 and has become one of the most popular 10 km runs in the UK. In addition, the city also hosts the annual Great City Games, featuring a 110m sprint track on Deansgate in Manchester city centre. The world's top athletes are invited and in 2009 Usain Bolt took part.
The Manchester Area Cross Country League, taking place every winter, hosts adult and child runners in multiple parks around Greater Manchester and Merseyside.
Rugby League
Manchester is a city that is steeped in Rugby League tradition, although the borough hadn't been home a professional Rugby League club based since the Belle Vue Rangers disbanded as a club after the 1954–55 season. The club started out as Broughton Rangers in 1877.
With in the county of Greater Manchester, there are six professional clubs: Wigan Warriors, Salford Red Devils, Leigh Leopards (all of the Super League), Oldham Roughyeds (of the RFL Championship), and Swinton Lions and Rochdale Hornets (both of the RFL League 1). The first of these, Wigan Warriors, is the United Kingdom's most successful rugby league side having won 22 league championships, 19 cup titles, and 4 world championships.
Old Trafford is home to the Super League Grand Final and has hosted it every year since its inception (except for 2020 due to COVID-19), and also hosted its predecessor tournament, the Rugby League Premiership final, every year since 1987. The stadium had hosted three world cup finals in 2000, 2013, and 2021, with other stadiums in the county also hosting several world cup matches throughout history.
Canadian side Toronto Wolfpack used to complete in the British rugby league system. Their United Kingdom base was the Manchester Metropolitan University. In 2018 the Wolfpack and MMU jointly established a player development pathway in which the Wolfpack coach the MMU's university team, operate youth programs in both Manchester and Toronto, and encourage top young rugby talent from Toronto to pursue the sport in Manchester.
The city also has several amateur clubs including Manchester Rangers and Mancunians RL.
Rugby Union
Sale Sharks are the professional rugby union club which represents Manchester and the North West in England's top flight rugby union competition, Premiership Rugby. They play at the Salford Community Stadium in Greater Manchester having previously played at Edgeley Park in Stockport and at Heywood Road. Heywood Road is still used by the National League 1 side Sale FC.
Manchester Rugby Club was founded as Manchester Football Club in 1860, eleven years before the formation of the Rugby Football Union. The club is one of the oldest rugby union clubs in the world, along with Blackheath Rugby Club and Liverpool St Helens F.C. The club's ground is at Grove Park in Cheadle Hulme. See main article: Manchester Rugby Club
Broughton Park Rugby Union F.C. is one of the oldest rugby union clubs in England and was established in 1882, just one year after the Lancashire County Rugby Union was founded and eleven years after the formation of the national Rugby Football Union. The club has had a number of different grounds in its time, mainly in the Salford/Prestwich area, but also in the south of Manchester. Since 2004, it has played at Hough End in Chorlton-cum-Hardy.
Old Bedians Rugby (Union) Club was founded in 1954 as an Old Boys club for St Bedes College. Originally based in Chorlton, Old Bedians became one of two Didsbury rugby clubs in 1965. The club is on Millgate Lane in Didsbury Village.
Didsbury Toc-H Rugby (Union) Club was founded in 1924 as "Toc H Manchester" in Victoria Park. After moving to various sites, the club arrived in Didsbury and in 1986 the name was changed to "Didsbury Toc-H" to identify with the clubhouse at Ford Lane in the Didsbury Village. "Toc-H" comes from a soldiers' club at Poperinghe in Flanders in the First World War. Soldiers and officers could get a respite from the battlefields. This place was named Talbot House in honour of a young lieutenant who was killed in action the year before. Signallers pronounced the letters 'T' as 'Toc' and 'H' as 'House'. When the rugby club was founded, Manchester soldiers called the new club as "Toc-H Manchester".
Burnage Rugby Club play in National 3 and are based near Parrs Wood Entertainment Complex.
Manchester also has other rugby union teams: the University of Manchester Rugby Club, and Manchester Village Spartans RUFC
New to the Manchester rugby scene is East Manchester RUFC. Also known as the Rhinos. Created in 2024. East Manchester RUFC is already a fan favourite match up with most of the amateur teams in and surrounding Manchester, with games being watched with huge crowds and high scores. Their two highest wins are currently a 129-5 home win over Old Bedians Rugby Club and a 0-100 away win over Sale FC.
Swimming
Victoria Baths are in Chorlton-on-Medlock.
Manchester has an Olympic-standard swimming pool in the Manchester Aquatics Centre, built for the 2002 Commonwealth Games, which is now part of the University of Manchester. The university runs the University of Manchester Swimming Club at the aquatics centre which was formed in 1885.
Manchester has a number of swimming clubs. The City of Manchester Aquatic Swim Team based at the Aquatic Centre and they run academy sessions throughout Manchester.
Cricket
Old Trafford cricket ground, in the Metropolitan Borough of Trafford, was originally the home of Manchester Cricket Club, but became the home of Lancashire County Cricket Club in 1864 upon the club's formation. Built in 1856, the ground is on Talbot Road, Stretford.