You’ve been saying AZ Alkmaar all wrong and 12 other teams too… here’s why

WE ALL think we know our football.

But do we know it quite as well as we think? Really?

GettyAZ Alkmaar and Athletic Bilbao are both incorrect names[/caption]

Because there are a whole load of teams whose names we’ve been saying wrong for ages – many of us without even realising.

A large part of that is down to geography.

Of the 92 clubs in English professional football, all but two have the name of their city, town, borough or region in their title.

The exceptions are Port Vale and Arsenal – although the Gunners were originally called Woolwich Arsenal when they played in South London.

As a result, we often tend to add the place names for some clubs that go by a single name to help us clarify which team we are referring to – more on that later.

For other examples, it is a case of mistranslation – or, more specifically, partial translation.

Finally, it could simply be a bit of laziness or ignorance.

Anyway, with that all said, who are some of the regular football clubs we mispronounce or simply get wrong?

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AZ Alkmaar is a common mistake.

The Dutch side are actually called Alkmaar Zaanstreek.

This often gets nicknamed to AZ Alkmaar – but the A in AZ stands for Alkmaar.

So AZ Alkmaar would mean Alkmaar Zaanstreek Alkmaar.

To make things even more confusing, Alkmaar is the city the club is based in while Zaanstreek refers to the Zaan district in North-West Netherlands. Got it?

Sticking in the Eredeivisie, there are regularly mentions of PSV Eindhoven when in actual fact the club’s full name is Philips Sport Vereniging, or PSV for short.

There is no mention of Eindhoven, the city where they are based.

The same rule applies to various other teams – where the city has been added for overseas fans to grasp exactly where they play.

See Zenit Saint Petersburg and CSKA Moscow in Russia – officially Zenit and CSKA – AEK Athens.

The Greek outfit are formally Athlitiki Enosis Konstantinoupoleos – with no mention of the capital city name – while AEK is pronounced as one word rather than A-E-K.

TV fixtures in December

Here are all the games that will be televised in December…

Tuesday 3 December

19:30 Ipswich v Crystal Palace (Amazon Prime Video)
20:15 Leicester v West Ham (Amazon Prime Video)

Wednesday 4 December

19:30 Everton v Wolves (Amazon Prime Video)
19:30 Man City v Nott’m Forest (Amazon Prime Video)
19:30 Newcastle v Liverpool (Amazon Prime Video)
19:30 Southampton v Chelsea (Amazon Prime Video)
20:15 Arsenal v Man Utd (Amazon Prime Video)
20:15 Aston Villa v Brentford (Amazon Prime Video)

Thursday 5 December

19:30 Fulham v Brighton (Amazon Prime Video)
20:15 AFC Bournemouth v Spurs (Amazon Prime Video)

Saturday 7 December

12:30 Everton v Liverpool (TNT Sports)
17:30 Man Utd v Nott’m Forest (Sky Sports)

Sunday 8 December

14:00 Fulham v Arsenal (Sky Sports)
16:30 Spurs v Chelsea (Sky Sports)

Monday 9 December

20:00 West Ham v Wolves (Sky Sports)

Saturday 14 December

17:30 Nott’m Forest v Aston Villa (Sky Sports)

Sunday 15 December

14:00 AFC Bournemouth v West Ham (Sky Sports)
16:30 Man City v Man Utd (Sky Sports)
19:00 Southampton v Spurs (TNT Sports)

Monday 16 December

20:00 Brighton v Crystal Palace (Sky Sports)

Saturday 21 December

12:30 Aston Villa v Man City (TNT Sports)
17:30 Crystal Palace v Arsenal (Sky Sports)

Sunday 22 December

14:00 Fulham v Southampton (Sky Sports)
16:30 Spurs v Liverpool (Sky Sports)

Thursday 26 December

12:30 Man City v Everton (Amazon Prime Video)
15:00 AFC Bournemouth v Crystal Palace (Amazon Prime Video)
15:00 Chelsea v Fulham (Amazon Prime Video)
15:00 Newcastle v Aston Villa (Amazon Prime Video)
15:00 Nott’m Forest v Spurs (Amazon Prime Video)
15:00 Southampton v West Ham (Amazon Prime Video)
17:30 Wolves v Man Utd (Amazon Prime Video)
20:00 Liverpool v Leicester (Amazon Prime Video)

Friday 27 December

19:30 Brighton v Brentford (Amazon Prime Video)
20:15 Arsenal v Ipswich (Amazon Prime Video)

Sunday 29 December

14:30 Leicester v Man City (Sky Sports)
17:15 West Ham v Liverpool (Sky Sports)

Monday 30 December

20:00 Man Utd v Newcastle (Sky Sports)

We don’t do the same to PSG Paris, Juventus Turin, Schalke Gelsenkirchen or Real Betis Seville.

In Spain, it is Atletico de Madrid, not Atletico Madrid or worse still Athletico Madrid.

Athletic should be used for the team in Bilbao.

But they are Athletic Club or simply Athletic – and definitely not Athletic Bilbao.

In Spain, there is just one major club it could refer to whereas in England we have Charlton and Wigan, for example.

Across the border in Portugal, it is a similar mistake with Sporting Lisbon.

They are actually Sporting Clube de Portugal, Sporting CP or Sporting – but not Sporting Lisbon.

It is such a touchy subject that a #NotSportingLisbon campaign was launched to raise awareness for the error.

The 2010 Champions League final was contested between Bayern Munich and Inter Milan.

However, Inter Milan should be referred to as Internazionale or Inter – although the official name is Football Club Internazionale Milano.

As for the German giants, Bayern Munich sees half of the name translated into English – Munchen to Munich – but Bayern left in German.

So it should either be Bayern Munchen – the official name – or Bavaria Munich.

One of the other big teams in Germany also needs flagging.

RB Leipzig are part of the Red Bull group along with Red Bull Salzburg and New York Red Bulls.

But the RB in RB Leipzig’s name does not stand for Red Bull – well, not technically.

It is no coincidence that the letters are RB – to make people think of Red Bull – alongside the red bulls on their logo.

However, the German FA ban corporate company brands in club names.

So they found a workaround and called the club RasenBallsport Leipzig instead – RasenBallsport translates as Lawn Ball Sports.

Many refer to the Serbian team as Red Star Belgrade when “red star” is simply a literal English translation of their official name, Crvena Zvezda.

And finally, the 1985-86 European Cup was won by Steaua Bucuresti, not Steaua Bucharest.

Although they now have a new name, formally switching to FCSB in 2017 as a shortened version of FC Steaua Bucuresti.

But the team is categorically not called Steaua Bucharest – which would be like the half-translation of Bayern Munich – because “steaua” is “star” in Romanian.

GettyAtletico de Madrid is the official name of the Spanish giants[/caption]

AP:Associated PressThe 2010 Champions League final was Bayern Munchen vs Internazionale[/caption]

GettySporting fans get very frustrated with the incorrect use of Sporting Lisbon[/caption]

GettyThe RB is RB Leipzig stands for RasenBallsport – not Red Bull[/caption]