FC Gloria Buzău

Gloria Buzău
Full name Fotbal Club Gloria Buzău
Nickname(s) Glorioşii (The Glorious Ones)
Founded 16 June 1973 (1973-06-16)
Ground Municipal
Ground Capacity 18,000[1]
Owner Buzău Municipality
Chairman Dan Tulpan
Manager Viorel Ion
League Liga II
2014–15 Liga II, Seria I, 3rd
Website Club home page

Gloria Buzău (Romanian pronunciation: [ˈɡlori.a buˈzəw]) is a Romanian association football club based in Buzău. The team played for seven years in Liga I, the most recent presence being recorded in the 2008–09 season. Currently, the team plays in the Liga II.

History

Establishment

Fotbal Club Gloria Buzău were founded on 16 June 1973, by the Buzău County Local Council, as part of CSM Buzău (Clubul Sportiv Municipal) (En: Municipal Sports Club), the local all-sports association.

Gloria absorbed the former team of Buzău, Metalul, whose place it also took in Divizia C (currently Liga III). With Metalul's players, together with other local footballers (especially from another team, Şoimii), they ranked 1st in their first season of Divizia C. Gloria won the subsequent Divizia B promotion play-off tournament and thus won promotion in their first year of existence.

70's and 80's

After several attempts to attack the first place in Seria I of Divizia B, Gloria managed, only 6 years after their establishment, to rank first at the end of the 1977–78 season and to gain promotion to the Divizia A for the first time for a team from Buzău. After a season in which Gloria obtained probably their best result in history (4–1 at home with Steaua Bucureşti), they managed to surprisingly maintain themselves in the first league after causing a major upset by winning against UTA Arad, one of the Romanian giants of the moment, and provoking their relegation. They relegated though the next season.

After four seasons, Gloria was again in Divizia A where they remained for three more seasons. The season of 1984–85 was Gloria's most successful one in history as they ranked 5th and obtained their tickets to the Balkans Cup, where they reached the semifinals stage, outpassed by Panionios of Greece.

Two decades of lower leagues

What followed was 20 seasons of anonymous lower-league football, including two seasons in Divizia C (2000–01 and 2001–02). After gaining promotion to the Divizia B again, former glory Viorel Ion took over as head coach and as player and led them to the Divizia A promotion play-offs lost in front of FC Politehnica AEK Timişoara.

Meanwhile, the club confronted itself with major financial difficulties, nearing bankruptcy. This went on up until the 2006–07 season, when investor Aurel Brebeanu took over the club from former president Dan Tulpan and managed to save the club. The same season also meant a big success for the Crâng-based club, as it won promotion to the Liga I after 20 years of absence.

In 2007, businessman Constantin Bucur purchased 52% of the shares of the newly promoted club, becoming majority shareholder.

Presence in the First League (2007–2009)

After the 2006–07 season, Gloria managed to promote to Liga I, coached by Viorel Ion. Businessman Constantin Bucur fired Ion after only a few matches in the 2007–08 season of Liga I, and replaced him with Ștefan Stoica. The team fought to avoid relegation to the last match, and managed to obtain the last rank that kept the team in the first league. The following season was more of a disappointment and Gloria finished last and relegated back to Liga II.

Back in the lower leagues

Abandoned by Bucur, and due to financial problems the team lost almost all the players at the end of the season 2008–09. The first season back in Liga II was difficult, as the team received an 8 pct deduction because it did not fulfill the minimum number of points in the previous season, and also lost the game from the first day with 3–0 by federal decision because it had some ex-players that were unpaid. They managed to find players only a few weeks before the start of the season. The board promoted Nicolae Anton as coach who had previously coached the second team (from the Liga IV) and the youth department. Although the team faced several problems it managed to get a run of 6 wins between days 2 and 8 (4 of this wins came between days 2 and 5. The team avoided relegation by ranking 14th; after a new season in which they finished 10th, further financial problems caused the team to revert to youth players, which led to the relegation to the Liga III.

The 2012–13 season saw the team fighting to get back to Liga II. Their main opponents, Viitorul Axintele, seemed to have the better of them at the beginning, but after Ștefan Stoica (who came back to the team for the season) had to quit in order to care for his wife and was replaced with Marian Roșu, Gloria started to make up for the difference. In the direct match in the spring of 2013, Gloria lost to Viitorul and the promotion seemed to be lost. At the end of the season, however, a Romanian Football Federation inquiry proved that Viitorul did not have three youth teams in the county-level competition, as required by Liga III regulations, and gave Viitorul a 9 point penalty that led to Gloria finishing first and promoting to Liga II.

Stadionul Crâng

Current squad

As of 05 March 2016

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Position Player
1 Romania GK Cătălin Andrei
2 Romania DF Alin Iordache
4 Romania MF Raul Krausz
6 Romania DF Daniel Vârtej
7 Romania FW Theodor Botă (on loan from Steaua București)
8 Romania MF Alexandru Ioniță
9 Romania FW Bogdan Danciu
10 Romania MF Dorin Burlacu
11 Romania DF George Ghiţă
12 Romania GK Dan Sârbu
14 Romania FW Adrian Răduca
15 Romania DF Sebastian Agache
No. Position Player
16 Romania MF Nini Popescu
17 Romania DF Claudiu Dumitrescu
18 Romania MF Gabriel Bobe
19 Romania FW Clement Pălimaru
20 Romania MF Mugurel Dedu
21 Bulgaria FW Samuel Koprindzhiyski
22 Romania DF Iulian Dăniţă
23 Romania MF Marius Voicu
24 Romania MF Georgian Marcu
25 Romania DF Cătălin Vlaicu (captain)
29 Romania MF Cristofor Marcu
64 Romania GK Andrei Preda

Club Officials

Board of directors

Role Name
Owner Romania Buzău Municipality
President Romania Mihai Marin
Executive President Romania Dan Tulpan
Sporting Director Romania Iulian Dăniță

Current technical staff

Role Name
Manager Romania Viorel Ion
Assistant Manager Romania Marian Roşu
Assistant Manager Romania Romică Bunică
Goalkeeping Coach Romania Cristian Stoicescu
Masseur Romania Adrian Ioniţă

Honours

Liga I

Liga II

Liga III

Romanian Cup

References

External links

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