Paola Hibernians
Hibernians FC are a club that, for a brief but significant period around the turn of the 1960s and 1970s, was managed by one of the greatest players in the history of English football, the legendary Stanley Matthews. The club, based in the town of Paola, was founded in 1922 as Constitutionals FC, then representing the pro-British Constitutional Party of Malta. Following a rift between that party and the Catholic Church, which in 1930 led to Catholic supporters boycotting the club, the team adopted a new name a year later - Hibernians - in tribute to the Scottish football club founded by Catholic immigrants, Hibernian FC of Edinburgh.
Hibernians are the only club in the history of the Maltese top flight never to have been relegated since it was established. They won their first Maltese championship in the 1960/61 season, with a side that included national team players, brothers Louis and Eddie Theobald, and Freddie Mizzi. A year later, in 1961, the club became the first Maltese side to play in European competition, facing Switzerland's FC Servette in the UEFA Cup. Around 1970, the club experienced one of the most remarkable episodes in its history when Stanley Matthews, the former Blackpool and Stoke City star and the first-ever winner of the Ballon d'Or, took charge as manager. Under his leadership, Hibernians won the Maltese league title and lifted the national FA Trophy twice.
To date, the club has amassed thirteen championship titles in total, most recently in the 2016/17 season, along with eleven Maltese Cups and five Super Cups. Known as the Hibs or Pawlisti, after their home town of Paola, the team play their home matches at the Hibernians Ground, opened in 1998 as Malta's first dedicated club stadium, though most league fixtures are played at the National Stadium in Ta' Qali.
