London XI

The football team city of London or London XI was a selection of London football players who took part in the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup 1955-1958.

The competition was launched on April 18, 1955 in life, and the first tournament took three years to complete. Participants should each be the best football team of a fair city, but had some cities such as London several strong teams. But as the rules would allow only one team from each city, it was decided to create a team for this tournament only. Was chosen mainly from the best players in the London-based clubs, with a total of 54 players participated in the eight games of the tournament.

The city selection London, led by Joe Mears, the coach of Chelsea FC, won the Group D after the selected teams of Basel and Frankfurt had been beaten. In the semifinals, the London defeated Lausanne Sports, but lost 2:8 in the two finals on March 5 at Stamford Bridge ( 2-2) and on 1 May 1958 at the Camp Nou ( 0-6 ) against Barcelona.

The selection of London XI participated only in the tournament 1955-58, while in all subsequent fair city cup competitions individual clubs representing London. Perhaps there were earlier comparable selection When machinations of London, denied the friendlies. Anyway puts a little note in an article in the Times from 1904 about a friendly game against the London football club Corinthian FC, ​​this suggests. The article mentions that the Corinthians had only an easy task in the game against London.