Sports Weekend

The latest news from football.

Florin Orban, 07.11.2025, 13:45

Universitatea Craiova defeated Rapid Vienna 1-0 on Thursday in the European Conference League football competition. The Romanian side thus recorded their first victory in a European competition in the current competition format. Oleksandr Romanciuk scored 37 minutes into the match. Craiova played a very good match overall and could have won at a bigger goal difference, but missed many chances. After three legs, Craiova have one win, one defeat and one draw, ranking 20th out of 36 teams in in the standings. The best-placed eight teams at the end of the main phase of the competition will qualify directly for the round of last 16, and the teams in places 9 to 24 will go into the play-offs to advance to the next round. In the next match, Universitatea will face the German side Mainz at home, on November 27.

In the Europa League, FCSB were defeated by FC Basel 3-1 in an away match. The Romanian champions lost a player 12 minutes into the match, after the elimination of goalkeeper Ştefan Târnovanu for a handball outside the box. Five minutes later, FC Basel’s Xherdan Shaqiri opened the score from a penalty shoot following a handball by FCSB’s Siyabonga Ngezana. FCSB equalized, in the 57th minute, thanks to a nice shot by Darius Olaru. FC Basel scored again towards the end of the match, thanks to another goal by Shaqiri in the 73rd minute. The final score was established on minute 88 by Ibrahim Salah. In the standings, FCSB are in 31st place out of 36 teams, with one win and three losses. Just like with the Conference League, the best-ranked 24 teams will advance to the next stage. FCSB will play their next away match on November 27th against the Red Star Belgrade.

The Romanian Super League matches are scheduled for the weekend, counting for the 16th leg, which is the first of the return leg of the regular season. On Friday, two matches: Universitatea Cluj vs Metaloglobus Bucharest and Farul Constanţa vs FC Botoşani. On Saturday, Petrolul will play Oţelul Galaţi in Ploieşti, Dinamo face Csikszereda in Bucharest at the National Arena, and Rapid Bucharest receive FC Argeş in Giuleşti. On Sunday, Unirea Slobozia play CFR Cluj in Clinceni, Universitatea Craiova host UTA, and FCSB are playing Hermannstadt in Sibiu. FC Botoşani and Rapid top the standings, with 32 points each. Craiova are next, with 29.