Steaua București is a Romanian professional football club. It is the most successful team in Romania, being the only one from a communist country to have won the European Cup, which it did in 1986.

The original football team was founded in 1947 as ASA București and belonged to the Ministry of National Defence, through the namesake sports club. It quickly became successful, winning the Cupa României (as CSCA București) in 1948–49 and (as CCA București) in 1950, the League and Cup double in 1951 and 1952, and the League four more times between 1953 and 1961. Renamed CSA Steaua București in 1961, the club continued to win trophies. Under manager Ștefan Covaci they won one League title and three Romanian Cups between 1967 and 1971. Altogether, they won the Cup eight times between 1961 and 1979, reaching the quarter-finals of the Cup Winners' Cup in 1972. Steaua's stadium, the 30,000-seater Stadionul Ghencea, was opened in 1974.

Under coaches Emerich Jenei and Anghel Iordănescu, Steaua won the League in 1984–85. As a result they were entered in the 1985–86 European Cup, which they won, beating Barcelona on penalties in the final. A few months later they won the 1986 European Super Cup. They reached the semi-final of the 1987–88 European Cup, and the final of the 1988–89 European Cup.

In 1998, the football team of CSA Steaua București ceased its activity and was replaced by a new team called AFC Steaua București, structured as a non-governmental organization. While AFC Steaua did not own the Steaua brand, it had temporary rights to use it, along with access to the club's facilities, staff, and players.

In the early 2000s, AFC Steaua began borrowing money from Gigi Becali. In exchange for the debts, Becali received federative rights over the players, along with the promise of receiving shares in the future. At the beginning of 2003, Becali established FC Steaua București SA, a joint-stock company in which AFC Steaua was one of the shareholders. This decision was made because Romanian law prohibited an NGO like AFC Steaua from transforming into a joint-stock company. Gigi Becali received 51% of the shares, AFC Steaua held 36%, Viorel Păunescu 6%, Victor Pițurcă 4%, and Lucian Becali 3%. The newly formed club formally requested permission from CSA Steaua to use the Steaua brand, as AFC Steaua had done previously, but their request was denied.

In 2011, CSA Steaua filed a lawsuit against Becali's club, arguing that it had been using the brand illegally since 2004 and seeking to revoke its rights. The Bucharest Tribunal initially rejected this claim on 17 April 2012, and the Court of Appeal upheld the decision on 20 December 2013. However, the High Court of Cassation and Justice later overturned these rulings. On 3 December 2014, the High Court ruled that Becali's club had no legal right to use the Steaua name, colors, or logo. As a result, the team was forced to play its next league match in an all-yellow kit instead of red and blue. On the scoreboard, the team was labeled as "Hosts," and an empty square showed instead of a logo. On 30 March 2017, the club officially changed its name to Fotbal Club FCSB.

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. This decision followed court rulings that recognized CSA Steaua as the rightful owner of the original club's name, logo, and history. As of now, CSA Steaua București competes in Liga II. However, the club is currently ineligible for promotion to Liga I due to Romanian laws prohibiting publicly owned clubs from participating in the Liga Profesionistă de Fotbal competition.

Foundation and early years (1947–1950) PeriodName1947–1948ASA București1948–1950CSCA București1950–1961CCA București1961–1998 CSA Steaua București1998–2003AFC Steaua București2017–presentCSA Steaua București

On 7 June 1947, at the initiative of several officers of the Romanian Royal House, the first Romanian sports club of the Army was born through a decree signed by General Mihail Lascăr, High Commander of the Romanian Royal Army. The club was to be called ASA București (Asociația Sportivă a Armatei București – English: Army Sports Association), with seven different sections (football, fencing, volleyball, boxing, shooting, athletics, tennis), and its leadership was entrusted to General-Major Oreste Alexandrescu. The decision had been adopted on the ground that several officers were already playing for different teams, which was premise to a good nucleus for forming a future competitive team. With this squad, Coloman Braun-Bogdan, the first coach in the club's history, went to a sustained training camp in the mountain resort of Sinaia. Although shirts, boots and balls were missing, atmosphere inside the team was rather optimistic.

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. The big surprise, however, were the 40 pairs of boots the club had purchased for the 20 selected players.Dida, Alexandru, Steaua fotbalului românesc, Pro TV Magazin, nr.51/IV, p.62-63

With a squad gathered in record time, ASA was preparing itself for the Romanian second league promotion play-offs. However, the new Communist government that had come to power in 1945 and assumed total control of the country at the end of 1947 stated that every sports association in the country was now to be linked to a certain trade union, be it a State Department, a Ministry or a company. However, this was not the case for first league club, Carmen București, owned by wealthy industrialist Dumitru Mociorniță, who saw his team excluded from the championship and later on dissolved, its place in the 1st league being now taken by newly formed ASA.Zbuciumata infiintare a Stelei

The team's first official competition was the 1947–48 Romanian Football Championship season, in which they finished 14th. Their first official match was played in Bucharest against Dermata Cluj and ended 0–0. The team managed to avoid relegation after a play-out with seven other teams.

On 5 June 1948, by Order 289 of the Ministry of National Defence, ASA became CSCA (Clubul Sportiv Central al Armatei – English: Central Sports Club of the Army), after which performances began to roll.

In 1949, CSCA won its first trophy in history, the Romanian Cup, after defeating CSU Cluj 2–1 in the final. 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.

The CCA Golden Team (1950–1957)

In March 1950, CSCA changed its name to CCA (Casa Centrală a Armatei, English: "Central House of the Army").

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. The first title was achieved on goal average (which was then used as a second criterion instead of goal difference), while the cup by disposing 3–1 of Flacăra Mediaș in the final. Two subsequent titles followed consecutively after that year and another one in 1956. The team also won the Romanian Cup in 1952 (2–0 v Flacăra Ploiești) and 1955 (6–3 v Progresul Oradea).

The 1950s were years of great domestic performances, ones in which the famous "CCA Golden Team" crystallized itself, a team which sometimes confused itself with the Romania national team itself, with players such as goalkeeper Ion Voinescu, defenders Vasile Zavoda and Alexandru Apolzan, midfielders Ștefan Onisie and Tiberiu Bone or strikers Gheorghe Cacoveanu, Gheorghe Constantin, Ion Alecsandrescu, Francisc Zavoda, Iosif Petschovsky and Nicolae Tătaru directed by Technical Consultant Virgil Economu and coaches Ilie Savu and Ștefan Dobay. 1956 was one of CCA's most prestigious years, when, apart from winning the title, the team enterprised a tournament in England, where they defeated Luton Town 4–3 (which they had already defeated 5–1 in a friendly in Bucharest one year earlier), drew against Arsenal 1–1 and Sheffield Wednesday 3–3 and lost 5–0 in front of Wolverhampton Wanderers. Also, on 22 April 1956, the Romania national team beat Yugoslavia 1–0 in Belgrade with a team comprised only by CCA players.

1957 was the year Romania switched back to the fall-spring system and in whose spring CCA took part in the Danube Cup (former Mitropa Cup), being knocked out by MTK Budapest in the first round. That year, the team also made their first European Cup appearance, being eliminated by Borussia Dortmund in the European Champions Cup after a third match play-off in Bologna.

A new "Star" (1957–1985)

In 1961, after having won the previous two national titles, CCA changed names once again (for the final time) to CSA Steaua București (Clubul Sportiv al Armatei Steaua – English: Army Sports Club Steaua). The name Steaua is Romanian for The Star and was adopted because of the presence, just like in any other Eastern-European Army team, of a red star (turned yellow now, to symbolize Romania's tri-colour red, yellow and blue flag) on their badge.

In the late 1960s, Ștefan Covaci was hired as manager of the club. During his first season in charge, he won the Romanian League in 1967–68 and three national cups in 1969, 1970 and 1971, before leaving to coach Johan Cruyff's Ajax in 1971.

In 1972, Steaua reached the quarter-finals of the European Cup Winners' Cup, defeating Barcelona, but lost against Franz Beckenbauer's Bayern Munich 1–1 on away goals.

On 9 April 1974, Steaua's home, Stadionul Ghencea, was inaugurated with a friendly match opposing OFK Beograd which ended 2–2. The arena was something new for post-War Romania, as it was built especially for football, with a capacity of 30,000 and with no athletics track. Up to that date, Steaua had played its home matches on either two of Bucharest's largest stadiums, Republicii and 23 August.

Internally, fierce rivalry with teams like Dinamo București, Petrolul Ploiești and UTA Arad made it more and more difficult for the military team to reach the title, the 1970s and 1980s seeing them win the title only three times under their new name (1967–68, 1975–76, 1977–78). However, during that same period, Steaua won eight National Cups (1961–62, 1965–66, 1966–67, 1968–69, 1969–70, 1970–71, 1975–76 and 1978–79), ultimately being nicknamed the cup specialists.

The first half of the 1980s was a very poor period for the club, as no trophies were won for six years. 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. However, these years of search and frustration did no less than to foretell the amazing performances of the 1980s and 1990s.

Champions of Europe (1985–1989)

Jenei's Steaua side

1985–86 season

Under coaches Emerich Jenei and Anghel Iordănescu, Steaua București won the national championship in the 1984–85 season, ending a six-year title drought. In the following European Cup campaign, the team eliminated Vejle BK, Budapest Honvéd FC, FC Kuusysi and R.S.C. Anderlecht, becoming the first Romanian club to reach the final of the competition. The final was held on 7 May 1986 at the Ramón Sánchez Pizjuán Stadium in Seville, where Spanish champions FC Barcelona were widely regarded as favourites. After a goalless draw, goalkeeper Helmut Duckadam saved all four penalties he faced, a feat later recognised in the Guinness Book of Records, while Gavril Balint and Marius Lăcătuș scored their attempts, securing Steaua’s victory and making them the first Eastern European team to win the competition.