Steaua fans

The term "Steaua Fans" refers to all people who support FC Steaua Bucureşti and CSA Steaua Bucureşti, a Romanian football club and a Romanian sports club respectively. As Steaua is, judging by performances, the most successful Romanian footbal team, they enjoy the biggest support among Romanian football fans. A survey conducted in 2004 [cite web
url=http://www.gallup.ro/romana/poll_ro/releases_ro/pr040108_ro/pr040108_ro.htm
title=Steaua - echipa cu cei mai mulţi suporteri
work=Gallup.ro
accessdate=2007-06-13] suggested that the Ghencea-based team accounts for approximately 40% of all Romanian football lovers, meaning about five million fans inside and outside Romania's borders. It is obvious that this large number of supporters is in large part to the club's outstanding performances, both domestically and internationally.

History

The Old Days (1947-1995)

However, at the beginning, being the club of the Romanian Army, Steaua drew its supporters mostly from people linked with the Army. The first waves of new fans came at the beginning of the 1950s, when CCA's legendary golden team won the hearts of many people delighted by their spectacular play.

It was not until 1974 with the erection of Stadionul Ghencea in south-western Bucharest that the Steaua zones of supporters came to standardize themselves in the regions adjacent to the arena, subsequently covering the whole southern half of Bucharest, a city geographically divided by the Dâmboviţa River.

1986 is the year when Steaua began to become the most beloved club in the country. The extraordinary success in the European Cup of a fantastic team that was to remain among Europe's finest for another three years turned everyone's attention to the red and blues. Dinamo, up until then leader in fan support, increasingly lost ground to Steaua, currently accounting for 16% of Romanian football lovers according to the 2004 survey.

Armata Ultra' (1995-2001)

The Steaua Ultras movement began on 4 December 1995, when the bases of Armata Ultra (AU), the first Ultras group in Bucharest (and the second in Romania), were set. For years, AU dominated the Ultra movement in Romania. It quickly reached an impressive number of 4,000 members, a record which stands up to this day for supporter groups in the country. Basically they adopted a far-right ideology [Angelescu, Dumitru, "Născuţi asasini", ProSport Magazin, 28/1998, p.12-15] with very strict internal rules, both inside and outside matches, such as no smoking, no eating, no drinking, no sitting, only standing and chanting. They stood out by their high number of membres, the big crouds dispatched to away games, chant power and trouble making, as AU had important hooligan influences. Many saw the disappearance of AU as something like the death of a legend. This occurred in 2001, due to internal problems, when smaller groups appeared, such as "Gruppo Apparte" and "Brigada XXL" which, in some manner, identified themselves with AU and gradually messed with their policy, style and way of life. These intrusions culminated with a conflict of their leader, Jean Pavel, with the Steaua Board of Administration. Even though extinct, Armata Ultra's spirit still lives on in most Steaua fans and a great lot of them still identify themselves with AU, as it probably was the strongest, most important ever Ultra group in Romania. [cite web

url=http://www.fcsteaua.ro/index/section/articles/article/2084
title=Istoria ultra' incepe cu noi!
work=FCSteaua.ro
accessdate=2007-06-14

]

Present day (2001-present)

Currently Steaua's supporters are not lead by a single group. The tendency nowadays is to form several small groups who play their own part. The most important part of them are located in the Peluza Nord (North End), some others taking their place in the Peluza Sud (South End). Because of different attitudes towards the team and the game (PS are usually tougher and more severe in which regards the game and often not so patient), there have lately been quite a few conflicts between the two. The four groups at the PS ("Ultras", "Glas", "Vacarm", "Stil Ostil", "Banda Ultra") even officially ceased activity for a while because of conflicts like these with the more numerous PN. Groups inside Peluza Nord include "Tineretului Korp", "Titan Boys", "Nucleo", "Gruppo Tei", "Skins Berceni", "Insurgenţii", "Armata 47", "Ultras Colentina", "Gruppo Voluntari Est", "Triada", "Roosters".

It is rather difficult to assign Steaua fans a certain style. They are described by the typical Italian style, common in different respects to all Romanian groups of fans, with lots of choreographies, banners, flags, doubleholders and flags swinging in the air but on the other hand still have serious Hooligan influences existent from the defunct Armata Ultra'. Therefore, they mostly resemble the West-European style, typical for fans such as those of AFC Ajax, Paris Saint-Germain FC, BV Borussia Dortmund, RSC Anderlecht, etc.

AISS

More recently, as up 2006, the supporters have formed their own official supporters' association, following the example of most European clubs. "Asociaţia Independentă a Suporterilor Stelişti" ("AISS"; "Steaua Supporters' Independent Association") was formed as a legal entity with its stated goals of 'protecting the interests and image of Steaua supporters', as well as 'identifying and promoting the club's perennial values'.

Gradually aiming for multiplying its members, AISS has involved itself so far in several actions as celebrating the club's 60 years of existence and a general campaign to protect the club's image against a certain negative influence of main investor George Becali over its historical tradition and values. [cite web

url=http://www.aiss.ro/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=26&Itemid=1
title=AISS va prezinta AISS.ro
work=aiss.ro
accessdate=2007-06-14

]

Racism

The issue has lately generated several incidents and fights between factions of supporters of Steaua and Rapid, some of them causing pitch suspensions and even being minutes away from provoking match suspensions.

Stadionul Ghencea has been targeted by UEFA in 2005, as a result of certain racist behaviours of some of the fans during a UEFA Champions League qualifying match against Shelbourne FC. The pitch was suspended for one match.

Pitch suspensions have actually been the key-word for Steaua and its fans during the last three seasons, as no more than 10 Liga I matchday suspensions (with one more to go in the next season) and one in the UEFA Cup have been dictated and cumulated against and by the Ghencea-based club.

Friendships and influence

As Steaua is the most popular club in Romania, there are, besides Bucharest, several cities counting a great majority of red and blue supporters among football lovers. Widely speaking, these cities are predominant in the Eastern half of the country, particularly in the regions of Moldavia, Greater Wallachia and Northern Dobruja. Cities such as Suceava, Iaşi, Piatra Neamţ, Vaslui, Bacău, Galaţi "(inside Moldavia)", Constanţa "(Northern Dobruja)", Buzău, Brăila, Târgovişte, Călăraşi "(Greater Wallachia)", Râmnicu Vâlcea, Târgu Jiu "(Oltenia)", Braşov, Oradea, Sibiu, Târgu Mureş or Petroşani "(Transylvania)" enjoy a great majority of Steaua fans which are often well-received even by fans of the local teams.

The club is also popular outside the borders, notably between Romanian emigrants. The Valencian Community in Spain accounts for an important number of supporters, being the most important area for this matter.

Steaua fans are also maintaing good relations with the fans of CSKA Sofia of Bulgaria, with whom they share the common root of once representing the teams of their national armies. The bases of these relations date from a UEFA Cup encounter in 2004 between the two clubs. Also, European encounters against Panathinaikos in 1998 and Slavia Praha in 1999 were premises for setting contacts with rival fans of Olympiacos of Greece and Sparta Praha of Czech Republic respectively.

Rivalries

Rivalry with Dinamo

Steaua against FC Dinamo Bucureşti has been the leading Romanian football derby in the last 60 years, as Steaua and Dinamo are the two most successful football teams in the country. It has also been and still is a match between the former clubs of the Romanian Army (Steaua) and the Ministry of Internal Affairs (Dinamo). Not once have there been famous clashes between different factions of supporters of them, in the streets as well as inside the stadium. The heyday was reached before a match kick-off in 1997, when Dinamo fans set a sector of Ghencea Stadium's South End (where they were assigned) on fire. [cite web

url=http://biz.hotnews.ro/articol_64971-Armatele-de-fanatici-din-spatele-fotbalului.htm
title=Armatele de fanatici din spatele fotbalului
work=HotNews.ro
accessdate=2007-06-14

] Between October 1991 and April 2000, Steaua enjoyed their moment of glory, counting 19 undefeated official matches in front of their rivals, both in the championship and the cup.

Rivalry with Dinamo also extends to other sports such as handball [cite web

url=http://www.prosport.ro/articole/isterie/25438
title=Isterie!
work=ProSport.ro
accessdate=2007-06-21

] , rugby union and water polo.

Rivalry with Rapid

The second rivalry is with AFC Rapid Bucureşti. Several matches in the last years between Steaua and Rapid have ended in serious clashes between fans [cite web

url=http://www.presaonline.com/stire/rapid-%EF%BF%BD-steaua--dusmanie-nula,16787.html
title=Rapid - Steaua / dusmanie nula
work=PresaOnline.com
accessdate=2007-06-14

] Rivalry has become even fiercer since Steaua outpassed Rapid in an all-Romanian UEFA Cup quarter final in 2006.

Other rivalries

Milder and historical rivalries are also with non-Bucharest teams such as FC Universitatea Craiova, FCU Politehnica Ştiinţa Timişoara, CFM Universitatea Cluj-Napoca and FC Petrolul Ploieşti.

Notable is also a non-football rivalry with "SC Miercurea Ciuc", Steaua's biggest rival inside the national ice hockey competition. Besides the sporting rivalry, this dispute also stems from at ethnic issue, as SC Miercurea Ciuc represents the former Hungarian Autonomous Province, whose inhabitants, mainly Hungarian, are seen as separatists.

Footnotes