KV Mechelen

Early days

The club was founded in 1904, a few months after the birth of city rival KRC Mechelen. The club had a first successful period in the 1940s. During World War II, in 1943, the club won their first domestic title. The second title came a few years later, in 1946, and in 1948 the club was successful again. After that, the club fell back. In 1954, they managed to finish third, only one point behind champions Anderlecht, but that was their last good season. Two years later, Mechelen was relegated to second division. During the 1960s and the 1970s, Mechelen went up and down between the first and second division.

High days

The club enjoyed a spell of both domestic and European success in the period from 1987 to 1992. During these five seasons, Mechelen won one Belgian championship and one Belgian cup title. They also finished second in the Belgian league twice and lost the Belgian Cup final twice. After winning the domestic cup title in 1987, and hence qualifying for the European Winners' Cup, they won this tournament in 1988. Coached by Aad de Mos, the balanced team with international players like Michel Preud'Homme, Lei Clijsters, Erwin Koeman, Marc Emmers and Eli Ohana defeated Ajax in the final 1–0. In the 1988–89 season, the team also won the European Super Cup against another Dutch side, PSV Eindhoven. Mechelen are the last Belgian team that has won a European trophy.

KV Mechelen seemed to be on its way to becoming one of the top clubs in Belgium, but quickly declined when their chairman John Cordier (who owned the rights to most of their players) was forced to sell many players due to his company's bad results. A few years in a row, Anderlecht, located in nearby Brussels, attracted top players from Mechelen such as Graeme Rutjes, Johnny Bosman, Marc Emmers, Bruno Versavel, Philippe Albert and Glen de Boeck. Coach de Mos also made the switch.

In 1997, Mechelen finished second to last again, and was therefore relegated to the Second Division.

Since 2000

On 10 June 2007, the team achieved promotion to the Belgian First Division. Two years later in 2009, KV Mechelen played the final of the Belgian Cup, losing it 2–0 to Genk. One year after that, they stranded in the semi-finals with a 2–2 draw and a 1–0 loss against KAA Gent.

After a successful 2010 and four seasons for the yellow reds, coach Peter Maes decided to leave Malinwa and signed a four-year contract with Lokeren. Malinwa made a deal with Marc Brys to take over from Maes. Marc Brys was coach of FC Den Bosch, a second division team in the Netherlands. After two seasons he was sacked and Harm Van Veldhoven was appointed for the 2012–13 season. Van Veldhoven also could not lead KV Mechelen to Play-off 1, the clubs' recent unspoken ambition. He was fired in December 2013. At the end of the 2013–14 season KV Mechelen appointed Aleksandar Janković as head coach. Despite Janković's inability to lead the club to Play-off 1, Janković left for topclub Standard Liège and Mechelen had to appoint a new manager. The club ended up choosing Yannick Ferrera for the vacant job, who had just been fired as manager of Standard Liège.

Match-fixing and 2017–19 Belgian football fraud scandal

2017 through 2019 proved to be a tumultuous period for the club. After eleven seasons at the highest level, the club was relegated on the last day of the 2017–18 season as a 2–0 win over Waasland-Beveren left them in last place on goal difference, due to Eupen beating Moeskroen by a bigger margin (4–0). During the following season, while the club was very successful on the pitch, winning both the 2018–19 Belgian First Division B and the 2018–19 Belgian Cup, the 2017–19 Belgian football fraud scandal emerged in which the club was accused of match-fixing their final match of the 2017–18 season, allegedly having attempted to bribe certain players and officials of Waasland-Beveren.

In March 2019, the club was found guilty and forced to relegate back to the First Division B despite winning promotion, and also denied permission to take part in the 2019–20 Belgian Cup and 2019–20 UEFA Europa League, the latter for which they had qualified by winning the cup. The club appealed the decision at the Belgian Arbitration Court for Sports which ruled on 10 July 2019 that, in accordance with the rules set by the Royal Belgian Football Association, relegation was not a possible punishment in the circumstances. As a result, the club was punished with a one-season ban from European football and the Belgian Cup. The proceedings were plagued with controversy, with evidence (including witness statements) from an investigation into financial crimes in Belgian football not being made available during these disciplinary proceedings, as well as the impartiality of the prosecutor being called into question.

Second Belgian Cup

In May 2019, more than 30 years after their last major trophy, second division side Mechelen won the Belgian Cup after a 2–1 victory over Gent in the final at the King Baudouin Stadium. Germán Mera scored the winning goal after Nikola Storm made the equalizer.