History of the Steaua București football team

The original football team was founded in 1947 as ASA București and belonged to the Ministry of National Defence, through the namesake sports club.

[5] In 2017, the Ministry of National Defence reactivated the CSA Steaua București football section and enrolled the team in the 2017-2018 Liga IV season.

[6] This decision followed court rulings that recognized CSA Steaua as the rightful owner of the original club’s name, logo, and history.

Thanks to sustained efforts, in the shortest time possible, the club soon acquired the first training suits, navy green, duck material of, and the first shirts, blue.

Because of the championship's switch to a Soviet-inspired spring-fall system, which lasted from 1950 to 1956, CSCA played that fall in an unofficial competition called "The Autumn Cup", held in six different groups, without a final tournament, winning one of them.

Under the new name, the club would enter the high-life of Romanian football by winning their first Championship-Cup Double in 1951, just shortly after conquering their second national cup one year earlier after trailing 3–1 past Flamura Roșie Arad.

However, several prodigies were transferred, such as Helmut Duckadam, Ștefan Iovan, Miodrag Belodedici, Marius Lăcătuș, Victor Pițurcă, Mihail Majearu, Gavril Balint and Adrian Bumbescu, who would set the basis for the future team.

Under the leadership of coaches Emerich Jenei and Anghel Iordănescu, Steaua had an impressive Championship run in the 1984–85 season, which they eventually won after a six-year break.

At the final, played on 7 May 1986 at the Ramón Sánchez Pizjuán Stadium in Seville, Spanish champions Barcelona were clear favourites, but after a goalless draw, goalkeeper Helmut Duckadam saved all four penalties taken by the Spaniards being the first ever Romanian to reach the Guinness Book for that matter,[12] while Gavril Balint and Marius Lăcătuș converted theirs to make Steaua the first Eastern-European team to conquer the supreme continental trophy.Gheorghe Hagi, Romanian all-time best footballer, joined the club a few months later, scoring the only goal of the match against Dynamo Kyiv which brought Steaua an additional European Super Cup on 24 February 1987 in Monaco, just two months after having lost the Intercontinental Cup 1–0 to Argentinians River Plate in Tokyo.

However, that match was marred with a questionable decision by referee José Martínez when he disallowed a clear goal scored by Miodrag Belodedici.

[14] During these last years of the Communist regime in Romania, dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu's son Valentin was involved in the life of the team.

Valentin Ceaușescu admitted in a recent interview that he had done nothing else than to protect his favourite team from Dinamo's sphere of influence, ensured by the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

The Romanian Revolution led the country towards a free open market and, subsequently, several players of the great 1980s team left for other clubs in the West.

Gheorghe Hagi left for Real Madrid for a record $4.3 million transfer fee[16] which stands up to this day for the national championship, Marius Lăcătuș to Fiorentina, Dan Petrescu to Foggia, Silviu Lung to Logroñés, Ștefan Iovan to Brighton & Hove Albion, Tudorel Stoica to Lens, among other departures.

Despite the title won in 2000–01, George "Gigi" Becali, another businessman, was offered the position of vice-president, in hope that he would invest money in the club.

[21] In the summer of 2004, following a third consecutive year with no trophy won, former Italian glory Walter Zenga was appointed as head coach, becoming the first ever foreign Steaua manager.

Zenga was sacked with three matchdays to play in the Divizia A, but Steaua eventually won the title, performance repeated the following year, when, under coaches Oleh Protasov (August – December) and Cosmin Olăroiu (March 2006 – May 2007), they also managed to make it to the UEFA Cup semi-finals (knocked out dramatically by Middlesbrough's late goal in the 89th minute after having eliminated local rivals Rapid București in an all-Romanian quarter-final) and to win the Romanian Supercup (1–0 against the same Rapid București in July 2006), the latter being the club's 50th trophy in its 59-year history.

Internally, even though ranked second during the winter break, they lost contact with leader Dinamo București, who built a massive point advance in front to win the title.

The 2008–09 Champions League season saw them advance to the group stage after defeating Galatasaray (2–2 away and 1–0 home), only to finish again last with one point, after Bayern Munich, Lyon and Fiorentina.

At first, the star fans were not happy with Reghecampf, but he calmed down by bringing them close to the Quarter-finals of the Europa League and won the championship, 16 points from the second place .

Costel Galca failed to make a second row champion league appearance, losing in the playoff of the competition after penalty being save by roumanian Cosmin Moti In 2011 the Ministry of National Defense sued FC Steaua București SA,[22] claiming that the Romanian Army were the rightful owners of the Steaua logo, colours, honours and name.

[27] However, owner Becali announced that his team would retain the original honours and UEFA coefficient, and was also hopeful of recovering the name in the near future.

The court also rejected the Army club's claim for the period between 1998 and 2003, which remains with the now defunct AFC Steaua, Viorel Păunescu's organization.

[30] In the 2017–18 season under the command of Nicolae Dica, it represented the last glimmer of FCSB by passing the Europa League group, facing Lazio, winning the first match but being destroyed by a 5–1 in the second leg.

In 26 July 2022, Nicolae Dica returned to FCSB managing to qualify the team in the UEFA Europa Conference League but having a macabre season losing twice 5–0 to Silkeborg.

[31] The team's objective was to advance to a higher league each year, aiming to reach Liga I, a goal that coincided with the opening of the new Steaua Stadium.

Due to the high profile of the participants, the match was moved to the Arena Națională and attracted a crowd of 36,277, setting a lower-league national record; Rapid București won 3–1 to consolidate their position at the top of the table, with Steaua five points behind in second place.