Romania II Division

Curiously, no internal league divides in Romania. Relatively equal teams, but perhaps more competitive than most East European countries. Yet, one can think that the clubs were too many to be really strong – often smaller cities had a few clubs, which automatically meant none had a chance of becoming a major force. In the second division there was the distinct flavour of ‘metallic’ names, suggesting clubs belonging to industrial clubs – and thus depending largely on the whims of the factory’s boss. Of course, outside Romania, second division was entirely unknown world, in which dwell mysterious formations and few familiar names – like Rapid (Bucharest), down on their luck, they ended 6th in Serie A of Second Division. Three other clubs from Bucharest were also members of this sub-division – Metalul, Progresul Vulcan, and Autobuzul. However, most of the second division members never played first division football. Like Dinamo (Slatina):

Standing from left : Stoica, Vlăduţ, Erdei, Mincioagă, Furnea, Ciocioană, Lică, Ghenu,    Virgil  Blujdea – coach.

First row: Cordoş, Gabrian, Frăţilă II, Asaftei, Bălan, Cotoşman, Stanciu.

They finished 12th in the 18-team Serie A of Second Division, barely escaping relegation.

Of the better known clubs

Otelul (Galati) was in second division and CFR (Cluj) were also playing down there.

A squad similar to Dinamo (Slatina) – not to the powerhouse the club is after year 2000.

Curiously, Cluj, a traditional strong center of Romanian football had no member of First Division at all. The local derby was played down second tier. But the championships went well – for instance, in Serie A only two clubs were obviously different: the last two were clearly very weak. The rest was a battle between equals – 8 points divided the 16th (relegation zone) from the 4th. And the 4th, Rulmentul (Alexandria) was not exactly out of the race for the promotional spot – they finished with 2 points less than the 3rd placed and 5 points behind the champions. First place was clinched by 2 points difference and the winners were not best in everything – they shared the league record in scoring with 7th placed Poiana (Campina), 4 clubs had better defensive records, 2 clubs had lost fewer matches. The winners excelled only in… winning. 20 victories made them first. The unknown Romanian second division may have been anything, but nobody can say it was not competitive. At the end three clubs emerged with promotion: two familiar names and a strange one.

Universitatea (Cluj) a few years back was playing in the UEFA Cup, but now were happy to return to top flight – unlike their city rivals CFR, who remained down.

FCM Galati were also coming back from exile.

The third promotion went to the winners of already mentioned Serie A. Viitorul (Scornicesti) – the only unknown club among the promoted. However, there was no such name in the next season of the top league. Instead, there was Olt.

Somewhat agrarian club, if their logo mean anything. They also got the future big star Victor Piturca for the new campaign. There was more, vague, and dark. The club was one of the youngest in Romania – founded in 1972. Scornicesti is most often called a village, although with population over 12 000, it is really a small town. And it looks like city too – with condominium buildings, not only individual houses with big yards. Scornicesti still has the 11th largest stadium in Romania, with capacity of 18 000. Larger than the whole population of the place… off hand, not surprising: such projects were done here and there in Eastern Europe, taking into account a population of the area of which the ‘major’ village served as a center. Ill-considered grandeur too, but it had been done. Especially when some ‘big considerations’ were at stake. In this case, Scornicesti was famous for only one thing: it was Nicolae Ceausescu’s birthplace. So, the original insignificant village was enlarged, becoming perhaps the center of Olt county. Football perhaps was not key part of the ‘natural’ project, but once the club was founded, it was not to stay small… partly, because Scornicesti hardly had anything else to show to the world. The club was ‘helped’ in its way up… so is the rumor. Very quickly they reached Second Division – what is mostly remembered from this climb is a 18-0 victory over their neighbours Dinamo (Slatina), which helped promotion from Third to Second Division. In general, the opinion in Romania is that the club was pushed forward and helped to stay in First Division for years. From aside, it looked like astonishing achievement of a club from tiny town or village, which in only 6 years of existence reached top flight, managed to stay there, and had a string of famous payers – beginning with Victor Piturca – at one or another time. The ‘master-builder’ of the successful teams was Mitica Dragomir, eventually very respected Romanian coach and football official. But everything is foggy about this club – Romanian sources give the club’s name as ‘Viitorul’ until the end of the 1978-79 season. In first division the club debuted under the name Olt – now establishing the claim of centrality and of representing the whole Olt county. In the German-language Wikipedia the name was changed in 1973. There are rumors that the Ceausescu’s family was directly involved in the rapid climb of the club and it may have been done, but others were directly involved: the Communist Party, local authorities, football authorities. The very fact of the significance of the place automatically made everybody ‘naturally helpful’ – big clubs from Bucharest dispatched young talent to obscure Scornicesti, referees were careful with their whistles, money were never lacking, and so on. It did not have to be done by direct written orders – everybody was ‘clever’ to figure out what was ‘good’ and what was ‘bad’. Football flourished in Scornicesti. As for the new stadium, was it ever full is a good question – even with the whole population marched to the stadium, still more people were needed… may be the whole Olt county was ‘encouraged’ to attend? Who knows. From aside, it was a rare success of a village club – all the way up to First Division at still infant age. Glory to the peasants. Ceausescu said pretty much the same.