Newry City Football Club is a Northern Irish football club playing in the Carnegie sponsored Irish Premier League.
The club, founded in 1923, hails from Newry and plays its home matches at The Showgrounds (pictured right). The club was originally known as Newry Town - it was renamed in 2004, two years after Newry obtained city status.
The clubs most successful time was in the late nineties. After winning the First Division in the 1997/98 season, they managed to finish in fourth place in the Irish Premier League, thus qualifying for the Intertoto Cup.
In this first ever season in European competition, Newry Town (as they were then known) were drawn against the Croatia side Hrvatski Dragovoljac. A 1-0 defeat in Croatia was followed by a historic 2-0 win at home to send the club into the second round. There they met Bundesliga side MSV Duisburg. Again, Newry were drawn away in the first leg, coming away with a respectable 2-0 defeat to the German professionals. A 1-0 win at home wasn't enough to force extra time but the side had exceeded expectations in the tournament.
Since the 1999/00 season, the club went into decline, culminating in a last place finish in the league in 2002/03. However, thanks to the restructuring of the Irish Football League they were required to play off against Bangor Football Club over two legs. A 0-0 away draw and a 2-1 home win kept the club in the top flight.
In the 2006/7 season, big things were expected of Roy Coyle's team, with the manager seen as the most successful manager ever in the Irish League, however a run of defeats and poor form left the manager leaving to be replaced by Gerry Flynn at the start of 2007.
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