Ventspils

Ventspils (Latvian: [ˈvæntspils]; Russian: Вентспилс; German: Windau; Polish: Windawa; Livonian: Vǟnta) is a town in northwestern Latvia in the Courland historical region of Latvia, the sixth largest city in the country. At the beginning of the 2012, Ventspils had a population of 41,998. It is situated on the Venta River and the Baltic Sea, and has an ice-free port. The city's name literally means "castle on the Venta", referring to the Livonian Order's castle built alongside the Venta River. Ventspils holds the national record for the highest temperature ever recorded in Latvia with 37.8 °C (100.0 °F) on 4 August 2014.

History

Ventspils developed around the Livonian Order Ventspils Castle, built along the Venta River. It was chartered in 1314 and became an important mercantile city of the Hanseatic League.

As part of the Duchy of Courland, Ventspils blossomed as a shipbuilding centre. 44 warships and 79 trading ships were built in the town, and it was from Ventspils that the Duke's fleet set out to colonize Gambia and Tobago. Metal, amber, and wood-working shops also became important to the city's development.

FK Ventspils

FK Ventspils is a Latvian football club, based at Ventspils Olimpiskais Stadions in Ventspils city and is one of the most popular football clubs in the country. The clubs plays in the Latvian Virsliga.

In total, FK Ventspils has won six league titles and six Latvian Cups. They became Latvian Higher League champions in 2006, 2007, 2008, 2011, 2013 and 2014. In 2009 FK Ventspils became the first Latvian club to participate in the group stages of a UEFA competition after beating BATE Borisov from Belarus.

Paul Ashworth became the manager of the club on 15 September 2015, replacing Jurģis Pučinskis, after a 7-game non winning streak.

History

FK Ventspils was founded in 1997 with the merger of two former Ventspils clubs – FK Venta and FK Nafta. Its predecessor, Venta, was one of the leading clubs in the Latvian league in the 1960s.

FK Venta

The next notable success for “Venta” was in 1967, when they won the Latvian Cup. By that time they had quite a fighting fit line-up, and 1969 already was their golden year when Venta became champions. During the tournament they gained 43 points; 20 matches won, 3 matches ended with a draw and only 3 matches lost. Additionally, they lost only in the away matches. They scored 45 goals and 16 conceded. At that time Venta's leader was a player manager, who is well known not only to the admirers of Ventspils, but the whole of Latvian football, Vladimir Chikinov.