Episode 2. UNIVERSITATEA CLUJ vs CFR CLUJ

To understand why this match is considered to be the “Derby of Transilvania” you have to know a little bit of history.
Transilvania was concurred around the year 1000 by Hungarian medieval warlord Stephen I who defeated early Romanian small medieval states. The Hungarians maintained political control over the province for more than 9 centuries, but the vast majority of the population was always composed of Romanian ethnics , who were regarded in most cases subhumans and had little or no rights what so ever. In 1918 , after World War I , Transilvania united with Romania and became a Romanian province.
The city of Cluj-Napoca is a very beautiful town right in the middle of Transilvania , with a population of around 305.000 inhabitants , 20% of which are Hungarian ethnics. For the most part things are quiet between the two communities , but there are , as always , people who can let go of old grudges. Things can be pretty tensed sometimes.
So, in that climate , in 1907 the club Kolozsvari Vasutas Sport Club ( or KVSC , what will later become CFR Cluj ) was formed . At that time Transilvania was still part of Austro-Hungarian empire and played in the Hungarian championship. Needless to say KVSC is a Hungarian name and the club is regarded by many people as the club of the Hungarian community in Cluj. There’s also a supporter group (not ultras ) called KVSC, and it’s comprised of many Hungarian ethnics.
In 1919 , after Transilvania became a Romanian province , Universitatea Cluj was formed and it is regarded as the team of the Romanian community . The supporters sometimes call their team “ The symbol of the Romanian hearts”.

U Cluj fans always associate the white and black colours of their team with the national colours of the Romanian flag red-yellow and blue.

Another episode to support this theory happened at the time of the WW II , when the north-western part of Transilvania , the city of Cluj included , was given back to Hungary as a result of a political treaty . CFR went to play in the Hungarian championship while Universitatea chose to move to the city of Sibiu and continued to play in the Romanian championship. About this episode the fans of Universitatea have a song that kind off goes like this :
“ Our team has an immaculate soul , not like the fucking CFR “
After 1945 when all of Transilvania was joined back with Romania , both teams continued to play in Romania’s championship , but “U” became the main team of the city while CFR slowly relegated into lower divisions. This ensured a very large and passionate fan base for Univeristatea , one of the early supporters groups formed in Romania.

Oldschool photos of Universitatea CLuj support in the 1980′s :

Their favorite saying is “ Mama te iubesc dar nu ca pe “U” / Mom I love you , but not like I love “U”.

The match between Universitatea and CFR was always regarded as the derby of Cluj and was always a tensed encounter , but it never really heated up until the mid to late 1990’s.
By then the fans of Universitatea were really organized in groups like Vechia Guardia (not really ultras) , Commando Zebras , UCG and others , and along with them the first choreos and pyroshows appeared.

Video and photos from the late 1990′s and early 2000′s:

But in early 2000’s CFR fortunes changed, a new investor came to the club , they began having some results and promotion after promotion they climbed up to the second league.
With the results a new wave of supporters came , and they started to organize themselves in groups like “ Ingerii Negrii / Black Angels “ , Commando Gruia and others.
But promoting to second division meant an old enemy was waiting for them… Universitatea Cluj and its fanatic supporters.
By the middle of the 2000’s a new generation of fans emerged on both sides , new type of fans , more fanatical and more inclined to use violence , and they transformed this derby into a very violent affair. New groups appeared Ultras 19, Fanatics, Boys Cluj , S.A.N for “U” Cluj and Camorra , Fidelis, Ultras Napoca , Patriots , Romaniacs and others for CFR Cluj. As both teams promoted to the first division their rivalry only intensified.
As an interesting fact most of these new CFR groups have members of Romanian origin , they declare themselves as Romanian patriots , they bring Romanian flags to the stadium and up until this year they didn’t used to mingle a lot with the Hungarian fans of CFR , not even sharing the same portion of the stands.
But as a paradox the bulk of the violence surrounding this derby opposed these young Romanian CFR ultras to U Cluj’s ultras.

Having a vast numeric majority and a much more experience , the ultras of U Cluj dominate this derby , both on the stands and on the streets. Many CFR banners have fallen into the hands of their enemies .

As a friendly advice . please watch this movie without sound )

The rivalry between the two sets of fans it’s so intense , that on one occasion , not even the presence of police and tv cameras did not stop a crew of U Cluj youth to make a full frontal attack on CFR’s fans ( CFR fans were celebrating a good result of their team in Champions League in the center of Cluj-Napoca ).

This episode came a few months after another violent and very talked about event, that involved U Cluj’s fans . It happened in 2008 , before the last round’s derby. CFR needed a win to secure their first ever champion title and U Cluj needed a win to avoid relegation. As you can imagine the tension in the city reached an old time high and the police was out in force and managed to keep the two sets of fans apart.
But they couldn’t control the fans of U Cluj , who ,as their tradition dictates, where going towards the stadium in a large corteo. They started using smoke bombs in the center of the city and when they changed the route the police wanted them to take all hell broke lose.
Police picked on them , set dogs on them , started hitting them at random and even brutally arrested A GIRL for using a smoke bomb. The fans responded , and in the fight that followed, a police officer who was filming everything was badly beaten. Several fans were arrested and two are in jail to this day . At the end of the day CFR was champion of Romania and U Cluj relegated.

This derby is not the most choreographic of Romania’s derbies, partly because of the smaller fanbase of CFR , partly because U Cluj used to play on a very old stadium ( and in the last years on stadiums outside Cluj-Napoca ) not really suited for big choreos, but the fans do their best to keep it as hot in the stands as on the streets. But seeing that U Cluj fanatics were rewarded a new five stars stadium and CFR seems to attract more and more fans , things are about to change for the better.

U Cluj

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CFR Cluj

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You can find the first episode of this article here