Orlando Pirates FC - last updated on 9 July 2009
(Courtesy of Johnny Beaufays)
Club name: Orlando Pirates Football Club
Foundation: 1937
City: Johannesburg
Colours: Black and white
Website: www.orlandopiratesfc.co.za
Honours:
CAF Champions League - 1 (1995)
CAF Super Cup - 1 (1996)
Premier Soccer League - 2 (2000-01, 2002-03)
National Soccer League - 1 (1994)
National Premier Soccer League - 4 (1971, 1973, 1975, 1976)
Bob Save Super Bowl - 2 (1988, 1996)
Mainstay Cup - 1 (1980)
Top Eight Cup - 7 (1972, 1973, 1978, 1983, 1993, 1996, 2000)
Castle Challenge - 1 (1992)
Sales House Cup - 4 (1972, 1975, 1977, 1983)
Benson and Hedges - 2 (1973, 1974)
Charity Cup - 6 (1993, 1995, 1997, 1999, 2001, 2008)
Vodafone Challenge - 2 (1999, 2005)
About the logo:
During the early 40s, while the world was at war, an influential figure entered the lives of the young Pirates squad. Bethuel Mokgosinyana, a so-called ‘social worker’ who was widely respected in Orlando for his philanthropy, was the man who provided Pirates with its first kit.
Mokgosinyana was an enthusiastic footballer and had played for a team called Phiri Phiri earlier in his days. When he took the boys under his control he gave them Phiri’s old jersey, which had the ‘P’ emblem on the playing jersey.
It took another ten years before the famous skull and crossbones emblem was used, and then only as a badge on black blazers.
The emblem was later produced for general consumption by an avid Bucs supporter, Rankus Mapgisa who began a silkscreen printing business in his backyard in the late 50s.
For a brief period in its seventy-year history the Orlando Pirates emblem adopted a circular shape but the skull and crossbones remained untouched before the shield was introduced onto the playing jersey in the mid 60s. The shield would remain untouched for the next 40 years.
When the chairman Dr Irvin Khoza took over the reigns at Orlando Pirates in 1991, he possessed an abundant level of professionalism and business acumen that would change the clubs fortunes forever. In 1998, Dr. Khoza took a bold decision to change the look of the somewhat aging emblem.
The new emblem was cleaner and more dynamic, the rigid and jagged edges of the old emblem where replaced with softer and more rounded edges which made the emblem more appealing to the eye. The change also signified Pirates’ primary objective of embracing the future and aligning it with the current trends.
On the unveiling of the new logo, Dr. Irvin Khoza said: “It was a very difficult decision to take but I knew that change was well overdue, the idea behind the new-look logo was to signify the transition the club had gone through in the last ten years and highlight the direction it was heading in the future.
"The challenge at the time was to try making the emblem appealing to the eye but at the same time not take away its essence and what it represents.”
The star on top of the emblem embodies the clubs’ highest sporting achievement.
The golden star was introduced in 1996 a year after Orlando Pirates defeated Asec Mimosa (Ivory Coast) to claim the most prestigious African title, the African Champions Cup (now known as the African Champions League).
Orlando Pirates is currently the only football club in the Southern Hemisphere that has ever won the African Champions trophy
The logo has remained unchanged since its re-launch 1998, however in 2000, the emblem was somewhat modified with the inclusion of silver added to the inner curves.
Club crests: (roll on the crest to get more informations)
Orlando Pirates FC -
Founded in 1937
