{"id":51624,"date":"2021-09-06T12:57:01","date_gmt":"2021-09-06T10:57:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/atlassp.mp2dev.reea.net\/the-history-of-romanian-football\/"},"modified":"2026-02-12T17:24:12","modified_gmt":"2026-02-12T15:24:12","slug":"the-history-of-romanian-football","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.atlassport.ro\/en\/the-history-of-romanian-football\/","title":{"rendered":"The history of Romanian football"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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In 1909, the first governing body for football activities was established: the Association of Sports Societies in Romania. It later became the “Association of Football Clubs”, headquartered in Bucharest. That same year, the first domestic football championship was held, won by “Olimpia” Bucharest. This was the first Romanian football team to be founded (1904). <\/p>\n\n

In 1912, the “Association of Football Clubs” would affiliate with the Association Football Commission. The president was Mario Gebaur, who was also a member of the Federation of Sports Societies in Romania (FSSR), established in the same year. <\/p>\n\n

Meanwhile,\n teams such as Venus Bucharest and Prahova Ploie\u0219ti\n (1915), Sportul Studen\u021besc Bucharest (1916), CA Oradea and Chinezul Timi\u0219oara\n (1910), AMFA Arad (1911), and CFR Cluj-Napoca (1907) were founded.<\/p>\n\n

The national team\u2019s first match \u2013 the first victory<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n

In\n 1922, in Belgrade, the first match of the Romanian National Football Team\n took place against Yugoslavia, ending with a Romanian victory, with a score of\n 2\u20131. Then, in 1923, the FSSR Association Football Commission was admitted in\n Zurich as a FIFA member. Thus, Romania participated in the 1924 Olympic Football\n Tournament in Paris. <\/p>\n\n

The establishment\nof the Federation <\/strong><\/h3>\n\n

In\n 1930, the Central Association Football Commission became the Romanian Association Football Federation\n (FRFA). The domestic championship, Divizia A, debuted with the\n 1932\u20131933 season. The Romanian Cup was inaugurated in 1933. <\/p>\n\n

Up\n to the outbreak of the Second World War, Romania\u2019s champions were:\n Ripensia, Venus, and Unirea Tricolor. The Romanian Cup, in turn, entered the trophy cabinet\n of teams such as Ripensia, CFR Cluj-Napoca, Rapid Bucharest, and CFR Turnu\n Severin. <\/p>\n\n

International\ncompetitions<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n

On\n the international stage, Romania participated, up to the outbreak of the Second\n World War, in three FIFA World Cup final tournaments: Uruguay\n (1930), Italy (1934), and France (1938). <\/p>\n\n

In\n 1945, football resumed activity; however, the socio-political conditions\n of the period led to its politicization.<\/p>\n\n

Old\nteams, new teams<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n

After\n the end of the war and the resumption of football activity, new teams were founded,\n such as: UTA Arad (1945), Steaua (1947), Dinamo, Universitatea Craiova\n (1948), Dinamo Pite\u0219ti \u2013 FC Arge\u0219 (1953), and ASA T\u00e2rgu-Mure\u0219 (1962).<\/p>\n\n

On\n the other hand, teams such as Carmen Bucharest, Ripensia, Venus,\n Ciocanul Bucharest, Gloria Arad, Chinezul Timi\u0219oara, and Unirea Tricolor\n disappeared.<\/p>\n\n

Up\n to 1970, Romania\u2019s champions were: Steaua, UTA Arad, Dinamo,\n Petrolul, IC Oradea, and Rapid.<\/p>\n\n

Other\nnotable achievements<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n

In\n the period that followed, Romanian football recorded outstanding achievements,\n such as: qualification for the final tournament in Mexico (1970), winning the Balkan Cup\n for youth teams (1974) and seniors (1980), the awarding of the “Golden Boot”\n to Dudu Georgescu (the most prolific continental footballer), and Steaua\u2019s qualification\n for the quarter-finals of the European Cup Winners\u2019 Cup.<\/p>\n\n

The\n 1980\u20131990 years were truly remarkable. The junior national team won\n the bronze medal at the World Championship in Australia (1981), and the senior\n national team qualified for the final tournament of the European Championship\n in France (1984). In 1990, the national team achieved another appearance at a FIFA World Cup,\n this time in Italy. <\/p>\n\n

At\n club level, the start of these achievements was set by Universitatea Craiova,\n which reached the semi-finals of the European Champions Cup (ECC) in 1982\u20131984. In\n 1983\u20131984, Dinamo reached the semi-finals of the same competition. In\n 1986, Steaua became the first and only team to win the trophy, following the memorable match in Seville.\n After this match (2\u20130 against FC Barcelona), goalkeeper Helmuth Duckadam entered the Guinness Book of Records after saving all four\n penalties.\n Steaua also qualified for the ECC semi-finals (1987\u20131988)\n and the final (1988\u20131989). It won the European Super Cup in 1987. <\/p>\n\n

At\n the FIFA World Cup in the USA (1994), Romania achieved its best performance in history\n\u2014reaching the competition\u2019s quarter-finals and\n ranking 6th in the world. It also qualified for the European finals in England (1996)\n and for the World Cup finals in France (1998). <\/p>\n\n

After\n the remarkable performance of the “Golden Generation” at EURO 2000 in the Netherlands and\n Belgium, Romania has recorded, to date, only one further qualification,\n in 2008.<\/p>\n\n

It\n is also worth noting the performance of Romanian teams Steaua and Rapid, which in 2006\n played a two-legged tie in the UEFA Cup quarter-finals; after this clash, Steaua\n qualified for the competition\u2019s semi-finals.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In 1909, the first governing body for football activities was established: the Association of Sports Societies in Romania. It later became the “Association of Football Clubs”, headquartered in Bucharest. That same year, the first domestic football championship was held, won by “Olimpia” Bucharest. This was the first Romanian football team to be founded (1904). In […]<\/p>\n

Read More… from The history of Romanian football<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1095],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-51624","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sport"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.atlassport.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51624","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.atlassport.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.atlassport.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.atlassport.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.atlassport.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51624"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.atlassport.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51624\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":51625,"href":"https:\/\/www.atlassport.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51624\/revisions\/51625"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.atlassport.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51624"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.atlassport.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51624"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.atlassport.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51624"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}