Football League Championship

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The Football League Championship (often referred to as The Championship for short or the Coca-Cola Football League Championship for sponsorship reasons) is the highest division of The Football League and second-highest division overall in the English football league system after the FA Premier League.

The Football League Championship was introduced for the 2004-2005 season. It replaced the Football League First Division.

1 Structure
2 History
3 Football League Championship clubs, 2005-06
4 2005/06 season-Football League Championship
5 See also
6 External links

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Structure

There are 24 teams in the Football League Championship. Each team plays the other 23 twice (once at home, once away) and is awarded three points for a win, one for a draw and zero for a loss. From these points a league table is constructed. At the end of each season the top two teams, together with the winner of the play-offs between the teams which finished in 3rd-6th position, are promoted to the FA Premier League and are replaced by the three teams that finished at the bottom of that league. (One exception to this was in 1995, when the FA Premier League reduced its numbers to 20. In that year, only two teams were promoted, the top team, plus the winner of the play offs between places 2nd-5th.) Similarly the three teams which finished at the bottom of the Football League Championship are relegated to Football League One and are replaced by the teams which finished 1st, 2nd, and won the 3rd-6th place play-off in that division.

Final League position is determined firstly by points obtained, then by goal difference, then goals scored, and if necessary, a mini-league of the results between two or more teams ranked using the previous three criteria and finally a series of one or more play off matches.

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History

The Football League Championship was introduced for the 2004-2005 season. It replaced the Football League First Division.

In 2004-05, the Football League Championship announced a total attendance of 9.8 million, which it said was the fourth highest total attendance for a European football division, behind the FA Premier League (12.88m), Spain's Primera división (11.57m) and Germany's Bundesliga (10.92m), but beating Italy's Serie A (9.77m) and France's Ligue 1 (8.17m). [1][2][3]. It appears that this included the attendances at the playoffs, as the leagues own official averages give a total of just over 9.6 million, placing it behind Serie A. [4] Also, the Championship has 24 clubs compared to 20 clubs in both Serie A and Ligue 1.

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Football League Championship clubs, 2005-06

Club	Finishing position last season	Promotion/Relegation 2005-06
Brighton & Hove Albion	20th	Relegated
Burnley	13th	safe
Cardiff City	16th	safe
Coventry City	19th	safe
Crewe Alexandra	21st	Relegated
Crystal Palace	18th in the Premier League	play-offs
Derby County	4th	safe
Hull City	2nd in League One	safe
Ipswich Town	3rd	safe
Leeds United	14th	play-offs
Leicester City	15th	safe
Luton Town	1st in League One	safe
Millwall	10th	Relegated
Norwich City	19th in the Premier League	safe
Plymouth Argyle	17th	safe
Preston North End	5th	play-offs
Queens Park Rangers	11th	safe
Reading	7th	promoted
Sheffield United	8th	promoted
Sheffield Wednesday	5th in League One	safe
Southampton	20th in the Premier League	safe
Stoke City	12th	safe
Watford	18th	play-offs
Wolverhampton Wanderers	9th	safe

Note: Reading have been confirmed as champions and, alongside Sheffield United, have achieved promotion to the FA Premier League for the 2006-07 season, while the play-offs will be contested between Crystal Palace, Leeds United, Preston North End and Watford. Brighton, Crewe Alexandra and Millwall have been relegated to League One, for next season.

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2005/06 season-Football League Championship

For quick reference, teams in bold are champions that also owned the league's top scorer in the season they won the title.

Season	Winner	Runner-Up	Also promoted	Also in Play-Offs	Top Scorer
2004-05	Sunderland	Wigan Athletic	West Ham United	Preston, Derby, Ipswich	Nathan Ellington, Wigan Athletic (24)
2005-06	Reading	Sheffield United		Watford, Crystal Palace, Leeds, Preston

For past winners at this level before 2004, see List of winners of English Football League Championship and predecessors.

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External links

Template:Football League Championship teamlist Template:English football league system cells

Football in England (Women's)
League competitions	The FA	Cup competitions
FA Premier League	England (men)	FA Cup (Women's)
The Football League (Champ, 1, 2)	(women)	League Cup
Football Conference (Nat, N, S)	List of clubs	FA Community Shield
Northern Premier League (Prem, 1)	List of venues	Football League Trophy
Southern League (Prem, 1W, 1E)	(by capacity)	FA Trophy
Isthmian League (Prem, 1, 2)	List of leagues	FA Vase
English football league system	Records	FA NLS Cup