Spezia Calcio is a professional football club that is based within La Spezia, Liguria, Italy. Spezia Calcio was founded in 1906 by Swiss banking entrepreneur Hermann Hurni (or Hurny in certain documents) who was a player for the initial Crystal Palace amateur teams in London while he was as an undergraduate. He was a player with Crystal Palace again in 1909.
The initial Spezia team kit for playing, with light black and light blue was an amateur Crystal Palace kit donated to Hurny after his return back to La Spezia. In 1911, in response to the choice of Alberto Picco and others to pay tribute to Pro Vercelli as an example of a smaller team that was able to compete with the larger teams and win, a simple white shirt was used, with black shorts, black socks. This remains in use to this day. In the 1920s before the formation of Serie A, Spezia played various top league games against the big names of Italian football, including AC Milan, Juventus, and Inter Milan. Spezia has played in every tier in the Italian football system.
Spezia was the winner of his first trophy in the Campionato Alta Italia which was officially acknowledged in the FIGC (the Italian Football Federation) in 2002 following an extended dispute, and the usage of a specific permanent badge was authorised. The tricolour badge is displayed on official jerseys during matches and is of a different design and size when in comparison to the standard Scudetto.
After the demise of Serie B in 1951, Spezia was set to remain in the third and fourth divisions for the next 55 years. In the 2000s, Spezia was relegated back to Serie B in 2006, bankruptcy, and the revival of Spezia to establish their status as an official Serie B team once again. In 2020, just 100 years since its debut at the top, Spezia finally returned to Serie A as the winner of the promotion play-offs, winning the second Serie A term for the 2021-2022 season. On May 15th , 2022 Spezia was awarded the third time in a row Serie A appearance for the 2022-2023 season.
