Marked for Rafael Baca
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad19 Oct 2026
A fracture rules André Duarte out for 39 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason FCSB will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Match17 Oct 2026
No end in sight to FCSB's wait for a win
6 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at FCSB has to find a result from somewhere.
Player ratings19 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 24. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Juri Cisotti in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at FCSB this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match17 Oct 2026
The goals have deserted FCSB
3 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at FCSB can tell you which week it ends in.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Rafael Baca falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad28 Sep 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at FCSB this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 20. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Match26 Sep 2026
Viitorul left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Words at FCSB training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rafael Baca is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Boardroom28 Sep 2026
Inquest at FCSB
The manager kept them in and said what needed saying. A response is expected on Saturday, and if it does not come the questions move upstairs.
Squad28 Sep 2026
The manager makes an example of Gustavo
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match17 Sep 2026
FCSB do the business in Europe
2‑1. Continental football is where a club finds out what it actually is, and FCSB came through the finding-out well against IBV.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 27. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Match19 Sep 2026
Still nobody has beaten FCSB
The unbeaten run reaches 9. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Juri Cisotti in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at FCSB this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Words at FCSB training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Florin Tănase is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Match17 Sep 2026
2 goals inside twenty minutes with Darius Olaru in the middle of it, and IBV unable to get near the ball long enough to change anything. Some matches are won before the first drink.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
Marked 8.34 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
A performance of 8.22 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Rafael Baca left out for the big one
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Rafael Baca will call it something else in private.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market7 Sep 2026
The unthinkable, invoiced: Daniel Bîrligea sold
FC Copenhagen arrived with $8.2M and left with the best player in the building. The board will call it business; the queue at the ticket office will use other words.
Match7 Sep 2026
FCSB up to position 1
14 points on the board and a place in the leading group. Nobody at the ground is saying the word out loud yet.
The terraces7 Sep 2026
Supporters turn on the $8.2M sale of Daniel Bîrligea
He is going to FC Copenhagen, the club has $8.2M it did not have on Friday, and the phone-ins have already decided how they feel about that. Selling well and selling somebody they loved are not the same skill.
Market7 Sep 2026
The Astra deal is off
Everything was agreed until it was not, and Vlad Chiricheş reports back to FCSB with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
Player ratings7 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 21. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Match5 Sep 2026
6 unbeaten for FCSB
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 6 matches without defeat is a foundation FCSB did not have in the autumn.
Squad7 Sep 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at FCSB this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Market7 Sep 2026
The name of Alexandru Pantea has come up in conversations FCSB were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Squad7 Sep 2026
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match15 Aug 2026
Daniel Bîrligea had done his part in building a 2-goal cushion. What happened after that was collective, and Universitatea Craiova were allowed back into a match that had been finished with.
Market17 Aug 2026
The paperwork is done: Sergiu Nedelcearu joins from Pandurii in a deal worth $500.0K. Now comes the harder part.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Tempers go at FCSB
Juri Cisotti was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad17 Aug 2026
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Words at FCSB training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rafael Baca is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Marked 8.04 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 17. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad17 Aug 2026
9 new faces, and FCSB are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
Match15 Aug 2026
2‑2, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
Age has not caught Juri Cisotti yet — 8.28
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.28 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Squad10 Aug 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Daniel Bîrligea and FCSB agree another 4 years.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Tempers go at FCSB
Juri Cisotti was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Florin Tănase falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad10 Aug 2026
The manager makes an example of Daniel Bîrligea
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Match8 Aug 2026
It finished 2‑0, and it was Mamadou Thiam’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to FCSB.
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
Marked 8.18 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Market10 Aug 2026
Nobody at FCSB has picked up the phone to Juri Cisotti
24 months to run and not a word offered. A club that lets the calendar negotiate for it usually ends up losing to the calendar.
Market10 Aug 2026
“They were honest with me, and I would rather know.” Răzvan Udrea has been informed he is not in the manager's thinking at FCSB.
In brief
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Market
Experience through the door at FCSB
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Market
Experience through the door at FCSB
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Player ratings
Florin Tănase runs at them all day