first english team to play in european cup
English football clubs in international competitions The European Cup began in 1955–56, but there was no English representative during that inaugural season as reigning champions Chelsea had been persuaded to withdraw by The Football League. The first English side to participate in the following edition was Manchester United, who were also the first English winners in 1968, ten years after their first attempt to win the cup had effectively ended when eight of their players died in the Munich air disaster when flying home from Belgrade after qualifying for the 1957–58 semi-final. Tottenham Hotspur won the Cup Winners' Cup in 1963.
England at the UEFA European Championship Its best performances at the finals were a third-place finish in Italy in 1968, when only four teams competed, and a semi-final on home soil in 1996, when it lost to Germany on penalties.[4] The team has reached the quarter-finals on two other occasions, losing to host nation Portugal on penalties in 2004 and to Italy in Ukraine in 2012, also on penalties.[5][6][7] On the other four occasions (1980, 1988, 1992 and 2000), it did not progress beyond the group stages.[8][9][10][11][12][13]