IFK Kungälv

IFK Kungälv is a sports club in Kungälv in Sweden, founded in 1940, and mostly concentrated on the sport of bandy. The club has been playing in the highest Swedish bandy league Elitserien for many seasons, at present since 2008/09.

The home kit is a red jersey, blue trousers and red socks. The home arena is Skarpe Nord. The supporter club is called Skarpa Gubbar.

As all IFK clubs in Sweden, IFK Kungälv is a member of Idrottsföreningen Kamraterna.

Kungälv

Kungälv is a city and the seat of Kungälv Municipality in Västra Götaland County, Sweden. It had 22,768 inhabitants in 2010.

History

According to official Swedish sources the city was founded in 1612, when the city of Konghelle was moved closer to the Bohus Fortress. However, this is disputed because other sources indicate that it was just a strategic relocation of the existing Norwegian city, the capital of Norway at one point under Sigurd I Magnusson, something frequently used for marketing and tourist purposes. For this reason, Kungälv could celebrate its "1000 year anniversary" in 1959

Sigurd I Magnusson (Sigurd Jorsalfare/Sigurd the Crusader) was the King of Norway (1103–1130) and is the most well known crusader king of Scandinavia. He was also the first European king to join the crusades at a time where Kungälv was Norwegian territory.

Sigurd returned to Norway in 1111, where he made his capital in Konghelle (in the vicinity of Kungälv in present-day Sweden) and built a castle there, where he kept a relic given to him by King Baldwin, a splinter reputed to be from the True Cross. Sigurd died in 1130 and was buried in Hallvardskirken (Hallvards church) in Oslo, in present-day Norway.