Olympique de Marseille was founded on 31 August 1899 in France's oldest city and remains the best supported club in the country. Its home is the Stade Vélodrome, an arena of some 67,000 seats known for an intense atmosphere.

Marseille has won nine French championships and ten Coupes de France, but is defined above all by 26 May 1993, when Basile Boli's header beat AC Milan in Munich and made the club the first, and so far only, French winner of the European Cup. The triumph was followed by a domestic match-fixing scandal that led to relegation and a period of rebuilding.

Owned since 2016 by American businessman Frank McCourt, the blue and white side plays in Ligue 1 and contests Le Classique with Paris Saint-Germain, the fiercest rivalry in French football.