PFC Botev Plovdiv

Botev Plovdiv
Full name	PFC Botev Plovdiv 1912 AD
Nickname(s)	The Canaries
Founded	March 12, 1912
Ground	Hristo Botev (The College),; (Capacity: 22,000)
Chairman	Dimitar Hristoloff
Manager	Kostadin Angelov
League	TBI A Football Group
2008-09	TBI A PFG, 13th
Home colours	Away colours

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Botev Plovdiv (Bulgarian: Ботев Пловдив), also known as the Canaries, founded on March 12, 1912, is a Bulgarian football club from the city of Plovdiv.

Botev Plovdiv is the oldest and one of the most prominent football clubs in Bulgaria, playing its home matches at Stadion Botev in the residential quarter of Kamenitza.

[edit] History

Botev Plovdiv Football Club was founded on March 12, 1912 by students from the Catholic College and the First Male High school in Plovdiv. They chose to name it "Botev" in honour of the Bulgarian national hero Hristo Botyov.

The club stadium of Botev Pld, renovated in 1961, is "Stadion Botev". Originally the stadium was named 'The College' due to the fact that in the early 1900's the pitch was owned by the Catholic College and it is still known by this name among the fans.

The club has changed its name several times: Botev, DNV (1947-51), DNA (1952-57), SKNA, Botev (1957-1968) and Trakia (1968-1989). The current name is PFC Botev Plovdiv.

The club is one of the best known clubs in Bulgaria. BPFC has won 2 League titles and 2 National cups. Internationally the club has reached one Cup Winners' Cup quarter-finals and one Balkans Cup winners.

Many great Bulgarian football players had played in it. The most capped players of the team in A PFG are Dinko Dermendzhiev (447), Viden Apostolov (429), Petar Zehtinski (351), Kostadin Kostadinov (349), Dimitar Mladenov (347). Most goals scored for the team in A PFG: Dinko Dermendzhiev (194), Kostadin Kostadinov (106), Atanas Pashev (100), Antim Pehlivanov (89), Georgi Popov (83).

[edit] Motto

Botev Pld's motto is: Krasota, vjara, borba ("Beauty, faith, fight").

[edit] Honours

Champions of Bulgaria: 1929, 1967
National Cup winners: 1962, 1981
Balkans Cup winners: 1972
Trimontium Cup winners : 1943, 1984, 1987, 1989

[edit] Colours

Botev's historical first kit.

Yellow and black - adopted in 1917. There are two versions about how the colors have been chosen.

The first one tells that yellow and black are symbol of the unity between the catholic collegians (yellow) and the orthodox schoolfellows (black). The second one explains that because the founders copied the whole organizational structure from the then very popular Austrian clubs, they took the colors of the Austro-Hungarian imperial flag (also the first club badge was an exact copy of the SK Rapid Wien crest).

[edit] Fans

The bultras

The botevists (supporters of Botev Plovdiv) are said to be one of the most loyal fan base in Bulgaria supporting the team during both good or bad times. The club is famous for its eccentric Tribuna Iztok (East Stand) occupied by bultras. Bultras is a generalized name for the extreme yellow-black fans and they are one of the three major football mobs in Bulgaria (along with Sofia’s CSKA and Levski). The word bultras derives from Botev Ultras and first began to be used by hardcore fans during mid-1990s.

[edit] Stadium

In 1959 the authorities allowed the building of a new club stadium at the place of the old field in the neighborhood of Kamenitza. The first building works began on 21 July 1959. Two years later, Botev Plovdiv finally returns to The College.

On May 14, 1961 the reconstructed stadium was officially inaugurated. The prime minister at that time – Anton Yugov – attended the celebrations together with the deputy-minister of defence Dobri Djurov and most of the influential communist leaders. The celebrations ended with a friendly match against FC Steaua Bucureşti won by the yellow-blacks with 3:0.

For more than 30 years there were no big repair works on the College. In 1993, during the presidency of Hristo Danov, some serious repairs were made. The visitors’ changing room was moved to the eastern part of the stadium. A tunnel under the East and the North stand was built in order to connect the visitors’ changing room with the field and the capacity of the stadium was reduced. In 1995 electric lighting was built, but ironically it did not face the standards for playing football in the night.

In the years from 1926 to 1947 the yellow-black club plays 6 international games on this field- from which two wins, three loses and one draw. The matches were against Admira Vienna (1:7), Kecskemét (3:2 and 2:4), Besiktas (0:0), Bohemians Prague (1:3) and the “Wunderteam” of Austria Vienna (sensational win with 5:4)

The attendance record was set on February 27, 1963 during the quarter-final of the Cup Winner’s Cup against Atletico Madrid (1:1) – 40 000 people. The record for the Bulgarian championship was set in 1966 against Levski Sofia(0:1) – 37 000 people, but because of the riots between the fans and the rush of fans on the field, Botev Plovdiv was forced to play its derbies at “The Big House” – the City Stadium.

Several times the city rivals from Lokomotiv Plovdiv and Spartak Plovdiv have played their home matches at The College. During the spring of 1980 “The Smurfs”(Lokomotiv) played their home matches there (followed by a relegation in Second Division) as well as one match in the Spring of 2004 (when they became Champions for first time).

The Gladiators from Spartak used the stadium for several matches during the 1995/1996 season.

One final for the National Cup was held at the College in 2000 when Levski Sofia won the cup after 2:0 against Naftex Burgas. In the summer of 2008 the stadium underwent some renovations to meet the requirements of the Football Union - The Central Stand was renovated and new visitors' changing room was built under it.

[edit] Botev Plovdiv FC in Europe

Season	Competition	Round	Club	Score
1962/63	Cup Winners' Cup	1/16 final	Steaua	2:3, 5:1
		1/8 final	Shamrock Rovers	4:0, 1:0
		quarter-final	Atletico Madrid	1:1, 0:4
1967/68	European Cup	1/16 final	Rapid Bucuresti	2:0, 0:3 (a.e.t.)
1968/69	UEFA Cup	1st round	Real Zaragoza	3:1, 0:2
1970/71	UEFA Cup	1st round	Coventry City	1:4, 0:2
1978/79	UEFA Cup	1st round	Hertha BSC	0:0, 1:2
1981/82	Cup Winners' Cup	1/16 final	FC Barcelona	1:4, 1:0
1984/85	Cup Winners' Cup	1/16 final	Union Sportive	1:1, 4:0
		1/8 final	FC Bayern	1:4, 2:0
1985/86	European Cup	1/16 final	IFK Göteborg	2:3, 1:2
1986/87	UEFA Cup	1st round	Hibernians FC	2:0, 8:0
		1/16 final	NK Hajduk Split	1:3, 2:2
1987/88	UEFA Cup	1st round	FK Crvena zvezda	0:3, 2:2
1988/89	UEFA Cup	1st round	Dinamo Minsk	1:2, 0:0
1992/93	UEFA Cup	1st round	Fenerbahçe SK	1:3, 2:2
1993/94	UEFA Cup	1st round	Olympiakos SFP	2:3, 1:5
1995/96	UEFA Cup	1st round	Dinamo Tbilisi	1:0, 1:0
		1/32 final	Sevilla FC	0:2, 1:1

[edit] Current squad

As of January 2009

No.	Position	Player
1	GK	Slavcho Toshev
2	DF	Vasil Vasilev
3	DF	Daniel Bozhkov
5	DF	Dobrin Orlovski
6	MF	Dimitar Petkov
7	MF	Georgi Avramov
8	FW	Erick Kabu
9	MF	Omonigho Temile
10	MF	Todor Timonov
11	FW	Georgi Andonov
13	DF	Kostadin Gadzhalov
14	MF	Nikolay Harizanov
15	DF	Apostol Popov

No.	Position	Player
16	DF	Nikolay Aleksandrov
17	MF	Krasimir Krastev
18	MF	Miroslav Todorov
19	MF	Dimitar Vitanov
20	MF	Nikolay Manchev
21	MF	Alfred Mapoka
22	GK	Pavel Stanev
24	DF	Ilian Garov
25	DF	Zdravko Stankov
26	FW	Yordan Etov
27	MF	Mauro Alegre
33	FW	Georgi Semerdzhiev
36	GK	Lilcho Arsov