I have just read about the CSKA - CSKA story and have been inspired to write about the Romanian cases. The divided Romanian football Romanian football has been "infested" the last few years with cases of teams going bankrupt (or another major mess up) and have 2 new teams fighting over their history, badge, trophies, etc etc. All these cases have lead to a huge divisiveness between romanian football supporters. The most famous case is Steaua Bucharest: CSA Steaua Bucharest vs FCSB case.Here the legal problem was/is about the ownership of the brand, badge, trophies, etc. From this fighting, supporters have been divided, the Sud Curve (Peluza Sud) ultras decided to go with the "new", 4th league team of the Army that has the colours and names of Steaua Bucharest. The Peluza Nord ultras were neutral and inactive until last year or early this year when they announced they will go and support FCSB at the match against Dinamo. I dont know, however, how the simple people (as in "they sometimes go to the stadium" and "watch quite often on tv") from Bucharest feel about it. I suspect that there are very few that that go to matches of both teams, but I'd say the larger part are with FCSB. Although, more people might be interested in Steaua Bucharest as they have just promoted to the 3rd league and are getting a new stadium. Outside of Bucharest, I think it's pretty safe to say that over 80% are with FCSB. This is not surprising as the average Romanian supporter is more of a "result supporter" and we can see now, as FCSB is doing worse, more and more stop caring about them. 2nd biggest case is the case of Universitatea Craiova. Universitatea Craiova have been founded in 1948. They have been champions and cup winners multiple times, produced huge players for team and country, one of the most loved clubs in Romania. However, in 2011, when businessman Adrian Mititelu was running the club, he got into a heated argument with the heads of the Romanian Football Federation which lead to Mititelu's team (which had major financial issues) was unaffiliated from the 1st league. This unaffiliation later has been proven to be illegal. He has been allowed to sign the team up for the 2nd league, but due to the financial struggles, they didnt finish the season, having been pulled out. Soon after, the company that managed the team went bankrupt. The same season, the local authorities of Craiova created a team called CS U Craiova. This team has been allowed to sign up straight to the 2nd division, in the season when Mititelu's FC U Craiova played there. They played against each other that season. This has split up supporters from the city. The ones that support Mititelu's new team say that he owned the real Universitatea Craiova, so the city hall's team is a fake clone. The supporters of CS U Craiova (city hall) have issues with the way Mititelu ran the club and had enough of him. There have been quite a few legal cases about this, don't ask me about them, it's too much of a mess. Currently, CS U Craiova (who now somehow use the original name and logo of the old club) are still in the 1st league and almost became champions. Mititelu's new team has promoted to the 2nd which will likely re-ignite the conflict. If Mititelu's FC U 1948 promote to the 1st, Craiova will be a barrel of explosives.
Craiova Im back, I was speaking last year about the FC U Craiova of Adrian Mititelu (who in the meantime was jailed again!) who promoted to the 2nd league and... they made back to back promotion, finishing 1st place this season. As Im writing this, there might be a small scale civil war in Craiova today. FC U Craiova is playing the last match of the 2nd league at home in Craiova, while CS U Craiova won the Romanian Cup yesterday and want to celebrate in the city. Both set of supporters, that truly hate each other at this point, are in the streets of Craiova. 1000 gendarmes (riot police?) have been deployed in the city to keep them apart. But even if they clash today or not, it will only get worse next season, when they will meet in the 1st league, possibly with full capacity back again. Steaua There was a huge buzz at the end of the 3rd league, as Steaua was 1st, followed in the 2nd place by FCSB's 2nd team. FCSB hoped to screw Steaua by sending a bunch of 1st league subs to the 2nd team, but the match ended in a draw. But, there was another chance, as, in order to achieve promotion to the 2nd league, a play off had to be played. Steaua played Mostistea Ulmu, the 2nd place from another serie of the 3rd league, while FCSB 2 played against FC Afumati, the 1st place (of the same serie as Mostistea Ulmu). The winners would meet in the final of the play off. Steaua won the 2 legged game with Ulmu, by a controversial 4-0 (both matches 2-0), where the referees were accused of siding with them. FCSB 2 won the 1st leg, 1-0, and people were getting ready for another Steaua - FCSB clash, but a huge upset, surprise was made in the 2nd leg, FC Afumati beating FCSB 2, 4-1, going through with 4-2 on aggregate. The 1st leg of Steaua - FCSB 2 was played yesterday, Steaua dominated most of the match and won it by a comfortable 2-0, but as previously, a surprise might happen in the 2nd leg, next Saturday. Otelul Otelul Galati is another traditional team revived by supporters. They have been in the 3rd league for a few seasons already, but this season they finished 1st place and got into the promotion play off as well. The 1st leg of the final was yesterday, against Dacia Unirea Braila, Otelul gained the advantage fairly early, but was equalized in the 2nd half, end result: 1-1. FCSB Once again finished 2nd, behind CFR Cluj. Owner Gigi Becali fired head coach Anton (Toni) Petrea. Reports came after a few days that he wants to bring in Marius Sumudica, an important former Rapid player and coach. This triggered supporters' anger which lead to the denial of this idea. It was later reported that FCSB did find a coach, more or less by accident: Gigi Becali wanted to bring Dinu Todoran to the academy staff, but when the General Manager of FCSB, Mihai (Meme) Stoica called Todoran, the latter told him he is at the church. Once Gigi (a very religious person) found out, he decided to bring him to the main team instead. CFR Cluj Won the league again and became the most decorated team outside Bucharest, with 4 league titles won. However, this isn't considered a big deal by most romanian football supporters, as CFR still is the 2nd team in the city by popularity and is kind of mocked by everyone. A cheap version of Manchester City, if you will. Rapid Bucharest They have also managed to achieve promotion, finishing in the 2nd place, behind FC U Craiova. The 1st league will once again have a true Bucharest Derby, Rapid being able to meet Dinamo, who narrowly avoided relegation by winning 5 in a row and drawing once in the last 6 matches of the league.
Steaua got promotion, after a 1-2 win in thr 2nd leg against Afumati (1-4 on aggregate). Otelul misses promotion against rivals Dacia Unirea Braila, losing 0-2 away. However, there are big doubts about Braila having money to finish the 2nd league season. After the mayor of Brasov has supported fan-owned, phoenix team SR Brasov, has been against the team founded by the previous mayor, Corona Brasov (ironic, isnt it? Who also achieved promotion to the 2nd league), now, mayor Allen Coliban wants to create yet another team and to give it the FC Brasov brand! This team would be "private" financed by the energy company of the city and based on an association he is a member of! Follow here for more romanian football ridiculousness!
Romanian football short news 1. Steaua Bucharest will not be able to promote this season to the 1st league. They didn't manage to set-up the team as a private entity (it's a public one right now, belonging to the Defense Ministry) fast enough, so will have to wait one season. Steaua stadium inauguration will be played against OFK Beograd (Belgrade) most likely with people in the stands. 2. Dinamo Bucharest has filed for insolvency. Apparently, the team has around 6 million euro debt. Supporters' trust DDB (Doar Dinamo Bucuresti - Only Dinamo Bucharest) are doing, without any exaggeration, a titanic work in hopes of saving their club. (PS: Why don't foreigner people invest here? Instead of buying a Championship club for 80 million pounds, they could invest in a Romanian team and with 20 million they could rule the league, get European football every year...) 3. Viitorul Ovidiu (Gheorghe Hagi's 1st league team) and Farul Constanta (Ciprian Marica's 2nd league team) have decided to merge. It is a sensible decision, Hagi being raised by Farul Constanta, which also traditionally has more supporters than his Viitorul has managed to gather even after a league title. This should create a strong team with a fairly big fanbase (all of Constanta county), with a lot of football know-how (Viitorul academy being considered the best in Romania) and now most likely in a better financial situation as well, both sets of investors now putting their money in one team. The next step is most likely getting a new Farul stadium, as it is in a bad condition, they will be able to use the small Viitorul ground until then. 4. FC U Craiova (of Mititelu) will be playing a huge friendly against Mourinho's Roma on the Olimpico in Rome. This is a huge boost for the team's image. The game will reunite 2 not so big friends, Mourinho who manages Roma and Adrian Mutu, Mourinho's former player, who recently became the manager of FC U Craiova. 5. If I'm allowed a little self-praise Our fan-owned Olimpia MCMXXI has managed to take over the badge of Olimpia 2010, bringing a piece of history back to where it belongs, in the 100th year of our club. Also, the city hall decided to do its own things and helped former players organize an old-boys match, with pretty much everyone disconsidering us as being Olimpia.
Welcome to another episode of Romanian Football Ridiculousness! Last night champions CFR Cluj lost at home the 2nd leg of their EL qualifier against Red Star Belgrade. After the match two staff members have started arguing, an argument which became a full-blown fight in the offices. To top it off, the owner of the team sent his personal bodyguards to beat them! This morning manager Marius Sumudica and a part of the players as well weren't allowed inside the training ground by the security. Sumudica claims that he hasn't even spoken to the owner and still is the manager of the team, security agent told him he is fired.
What's all this about the goalie scoring in the Brasov derby? SRB Brasov were supposed to be at home but it said FC Brasov in the stand. Are they groundsharing?
It was played in a 'neutral', 2nd ground of the city, as both teams use the Tineretului stadium for home matches in the league.
I wonder why investors buy british teams for hundreds of millions of euro and on top of that lose half a million a month with the club, when they could invest 15 million in a romanian team, make it a local powerhouse, get to CL/EL/Conf and get european money, prestige and probably run the club at a profit (or at the very least a significantly smaller loss).
No surprises. There is a significant amount of mismanagement and fraudulent activity right throughout Romanian football. Countless sides which have risen up from nowhere to get in to the Champions League or Europa League, only to find out a matter of 2 or 3 years later they’re plying their trade in the regional leagues or have gone bust. Sad to see really.
