PFC CSKA Moscow
PFC CSKA Moscow made Russian football history on the 18th of May 2005. At the José Alvalade Stadium in Lisbon, it beat Sporting CP 3-1 in the UEFA Cup final and became the first club from Russia to win a European competition.
The club is based in Moscow and plays in red and blue. Its name comes from the Russian for Central Sports Club of the Army, and in the communist era it served as the official team of the Soviet Army. That parentage tied its fortunes to the state.
How does a club with that kind of parent begin, and why have its names changed so often? What happens when one international match carries the hopes of two rival leaders? Why can a team that wins so much slide down the leagues, and how does it climb back? And who stands behind a club with the army in its name once the army lets go?
The letters CSKA are only the latest label on a club that has gone through a long string of names. Its football section began in 1911 inside the Amateur Society of Skiing Sports, known by the initials OLLS.
In 1923 the team sat under the Experimental and Demonstrational Playground of the Military Education Association. From 1924 to 1927 the same kind of playground belonged to the Military Administration instead. In 1928 it became the Sports Club of the Central House of the Red Army, abbreviated CDKA, and kept that name until 1950.
The word Red gave way to Soviet in 1951, which produced CDSA. In 1957 the sports society was renamed the Central Sports Club of the Ministry of Defense, or CSK MO. By 1960 it had settled on the shorter CSKA. The football department itself has used the name PFC CSKA Moscow only since 1994.
The 1921 final for the Fulda Cup, which decided the autumn Moscow championship, set OLLS against a team called KFS. KFS won 6-0. The next year OLLS players took the spring Moscow championship and finished second in the autumn one.
In 1922 they also won the KFS-Kolomyagi Cup, which brought together the winners of Moscow's first and second leagues. They collected the Tosmen Cup as well, where the champions of Moscow met the champions of Petrograd.
In 1938 a forward named Grigory Fedotov scored 20 league goals for the army side, and the club's records still list that as the best total of the season.
Grigory Fedotov, the best scorer in the club's history, was part of the squad when league football resumed after the Second World War. The army men finished as runners-up in 1945, the first edition of the restarted Vysschaya Liga.
Three championship titles in a row followed, the first time any side in the league had managed that. The year 1948 brought the club's first double, and with it a second Soviet Cup. In the semifinal CDKA beat Dynamo Moscow after a replay, and in the final it defeated Spartak, the current holders. By then the team had been nicknamed the Team of Lieutenants.
Another title came in 1950. In 1951, now playing as CDSA, the club won a second double. Vsevolod Bobrov shows how tangled the army's sporting life was. He played football and ice hockey in parallel, and the football story is closely linked with the club's hockey department, HC CSKA Moscow.
The Olympic Games in Helsinki in 1952 marked the start of a steep decline for CDSA. Its players formed the core of the Soviet national team, which joined FIFA after tough negotiations shortly before the football tournament. Boris Arkadiev coached both the national side and the army club.
The Soviet Union drew Yugoslavia, and the match carried far more than sporting weight. Joseph Stalin and Josip Tito had split in 1948, and Yugoslavia had been excluded from the Communist Information Bureau. Before the game, both leaders sent telegrams to their teams, which shows how much it mattered to them.
Yugoslavia led 5-1. A Soviet comeback in the last 15 minutes made it 5-5. The replay went to Yugoslavia, 3-1.
The defeat hit Soviet football hard, and CDSA suffered most. After only three games of the league season, the club had to withdraw, and it was later disbanded. Arkadiev was stripped of his title of Merited Master of Sports of the USSR.
Lavrentiy Beria, the intelligence chief, is described as seeing the Olympic exit as the perfect chance to remove the army's successful Moscow rival. He was honorary president of Dynamo Moscow, the club's main rival.
After two seasons of absence, and after Stalin's death in the spring of 1953, CDSA was re-established in 1954. The initiative came from the Soviet Defense Minister, Nikolai Bulganin. In 1955 the club won the Soviet Cup against Dynamo Moscow, in a final where the legendary goalkeeper Lev Yashin was sent off.
The next trophy took 15 years to arrive, and it was settled in a play-off that began in Tashkent.
On the 5th of December 1970 in Tashkent, then in the Uzbek SSR, CSKA and Dynamo Moscow played a gold match, because they had finished the season on equal points. It ended without a goal. The next day CSKA came back from 1-3 down to win 4-3 and claim its sixth Soviet title.
The championship sent the club into the first round of the European Cup. CSKA beat the Turkish club Galatasaray there, then lost to the Belgian champion Standard Liège in the second round.
The 1984 season brought a first for the club that nobody wanted. With only 19 points from a possible 68, CSKA was relegated to the second division for the first time, and it spent two seasons there.
A return to the top flight did not last. In 1987 a second relegation followed. This time the club needed two seasons in the First League, but it came back strongly. It finished as runner-up immediately after returning, and in 1991 it won the final edition of the Soviet championship.
Combined with the Soviet Cup that year, this made the last golden double in the history of Soviet football.
The 1991 title sent CSKA into the 1992-93 UEFA Champions League. In the first round it beat Víkingur Reykjavík of Iceland. In the second round it knocked out Barcelona, coached by Johan Cruyff.
Group A was far tougher. It included Olympique Marseille, the reigning Champions League winners, along with Glasgow Rangers and Club Brugge. CSKA could not build on the Barcelona result and finished fourth with two draws and four defeats.
The Soviet league that had given the club its titles no longer existed, and a new Russian Top Division was about to begin.
CSKA was a founding member of the new Russian Top Division after the Soviet Union dissolved. In its first six seasons, the team sat in the middle of the table. It was runner-up in 1998 and third in 1999, then slipped back to the middle for two seasons.
In 2002 the team, trained by Valery Gazzaev, finished second and won the Russian Cup. In 2003 it won the first championship of its history in the Russian Premier League.
Then came an abrupt change. Gazzaev was sacked, which surprised many, and the Portuguese coach Artur Jorge replaced him. The team could not repeat its form, and by July 2004 it had fallen to fifth. Jorge was sacked after only eight months. Gazzaev returned, saved the season and took the club to second place.
Benfica of Portugal were the first obstacle in the 2004-05 UEFA Cup. CSKA had finished third in its Champions League group and dropped into the UEFA Cup play-off. It beat Benfica 2-0 at home and drew 1-1 away.
Partizan of Serbia came next. The first match in Belgrade ended 1-1, and the return in Krasnodar finished 2-0 for the red and blue side. Then Auxerre of France were beaten 4-0 at home. CSKA lost the return 2-0 but went through.
In the semifinal, Parma of Italy held CSKA to a 0-0 draw in the first match. The return ended in a 3-0 win, and the Muscovites reached the final.
Liverpool of England beat CSKA in the UEFA Super Cup on the 26th of August 2005 at the Stade Louis II in Monaco. Yet 2005 still brought CSKA the first treble by a Russian club, adding a second Russian championship and the Russian Cup. In 2006 it won all three national prizes: the Premier League, the Russian Cup and the Russian Super Cup.
The 2006-07 Champions League began for CSKA in the third qualifying round, where MFK Ružomberok stood in the way. After third place in the group, the team dropped into the UEFA Cup and went out to Maccabi Haifa of Israel in the round of 32.
In the 2007-08 Champions League, CSKA finished fourth and last in its group, with one draw and five defeats. It was third in the league but still won the Russian Super Cup.
By the break of the 2008 season, CSKA sat only seventh. Gazzaev, who had announced he would retire at the end of the year, switched to four defenders and let the young Alan Dzagoev show himself. Dzagoev was considered one of the greatest talents in Russian football.
The team found its form but could not catch Rubin Kazan, and it finished as runner-up. In the 2008-09 UEFA Cup, CSKA was the only team to take twelve points from four group matches. Shakhtar Donetsk, the eventual winners, beat it in the round of 16 after a 1-0 home win and a 0-2 defeat away. The Russian Cup, its fourth, did arrive.
In January 2009 the Brazilian Zico became head coach. After half of the 2009 season the club was only fourth, and it ended fifth, which was just enough for the Europa League. Zico was dismissed in September 2009.
The Spaniard Juande Ramos took over that month and lasted only 47 days. He was released on the 26th of October, and Leonid Slutsky replaced him.
The same season, the club won the Russian Supercup for the fourth time and the Russian Cup for the fifth time. It also reached the Champions League quarter-finals for the first time, after beating Sevilla 3-2 on aggregate. Inter Milan, the eventual winners, ended the run with 1-0 wins in both Milan and Moscow.
Slutsky, the third head coach in under a year, would stay for more than seven years.
Ural Ekaterinburg, then a second-division side, knocked CSKA out of the Russian Cup in the round of 32 in 2010. That was a rare bad day in Leonid Slutsky's first full season, which ended with the club as league runner-up. In the Europa League, the team reached the round of 16 and lost to the eventual winners Porto, by 0-1 and 1-2.
On the 7th of December 2011, CSKA beat Inter Milan 2-1 in Milan and secured a place in the Champions League knockout phase. Group B also included Trabzonspor and Lille, and Inter took first place. Real Madrid ended the run in the round of 16, winning 5-2 on aggregate.
The centenary year, 2011, had already brought a trophy. On the 22nd of May 2011, CSKA beat Alania Vladikavkaz 2-1 in the final for its sixth Russian Cup. In the league, the 2011-12 team was second after the first phase of the season but ended third.
AIK of Sweden ended the 2012-13 Europa League for CSKA in the play-off round. CSKA won 1-0 in Moscow and lost 2-0 in Stockholm. Yet the season ended with an eleventh league title and a double with the Russian Cup.
Bayern Munich, Manchester City and Viktoria Plzeň were the group opponents in the 2013-14 Champions League. CSKA took one win and five defeats and finished fourth. At home, Zoran Tošić scored the decisive goal against Lokomotiv Moscow on the final matchday. It gave the club a second title in a row and its tenth league victory in a row.
In 2015-16 CSKA passed Sparta Prague and Sporting in qualifying. Group B then paired it with PSV Eindhoven, Manchester United and Wolfsburg, and it did not reach the round of 16.
In the league, the club opened with six consecutive wins, the first four without conceding a goal. It finished two points ahead of Rostov, for its sixth Russian title and 13th overall.
Monaco, Bayer Leverkusen and Tottenham Hotspur made up Group E of the 2016-17 Champions League. On the 6th of October 2016 came news of a 30-day UEFA ban for Roman Eremenko, one of the team leaders. On the 18th of November, UEFA announced a two-year ban after he tested positive for cocaine.
Without him, CSKA could not win a single group game and went out. After the final match against Tottenham and a poor run in the league, Slutsky left at his own request. Viktor Goncharenko was announced as the new manager on the 12th of December, on a two-year contract.
AEK Athens and then Young Boys stood between CSKA and the 2017-18 Champions League group stage. In Group A, with Benfica, Manchester United and Basel, the club finished third. It moved into the Europa League and reached the quarter-finals, where Arsenal beat it.
On the 21st of July 2018, Goncharenko extended his contract until the end of the 2019-20 season. That summer, the club lost many leaders. Aleksei and Vasili Berezutski and Sergei Ignashevich retired, Alexandr Golovin went to AS Monaco, Pontus Wernbloom joined PAOK, and Bibras Natcho moved to Olympiacos.
Even so, the season opened well. CSKA beat Real Madrid 1-0 in Moscow and 3-0 in Madrid in the Champions League group stage.
Goncharenko left by mutual consent on the 22nd of March 2021. The next day, the club appointed its former striker Ivica Olić. After nine games, CSKA finished sixth in 2020-21 and missed European competition for the first time in 20 years. Olić left by mutual consent on the 15th of June 2021.
Aleksei Berezutski took temporary charge and was confirmed as permanent head coach on the 19th of July 2021. In February 2022, the United States Department of the Treasury sanctioned the club as an asset of the state-controlled VEB.RF, after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The European Club Association suspended the team.
On the pitch, CSKA won six league games in a row, and Berezutski was named league coach of the month for March 2022. The club rose to third, within six points of Zenit Saint Petersburg. Then it won only twice in the last 8 games and finished fifth.
On the 15th of June 2022, Berezutski left by mutual agreement, and Vladimir Fedotov was appointed the same day. Fedotov led CSKA to second place in 2022-23, and the club also won the Russian Cup.
Marko Nikolić was appointed before the 2024-25 season. In his first year, CSKA finished third in the Russian Premier League and won the Russian Cup.
That Russian Cup was the fourteenth on the club's honours list, which counts Soviet and Russian editions together.
In 2012 the Ministry of Defence sold its entire 24.94 percent stake in CSKA to Bluecastle Enterprises Ltd. Bluecastle has owned 100 percent of the club since then. The ownership record names Yevgeni Giner alongside Bluecastle, and he is also listed as the club's president.
Before that, the Soviet and then the Russian Ministry of Defence held the club through the CSKA Moscow sports society. After the Soviet Union dissolved, the club became privately owned.
Money from sponsors followed the new owners. Roman Abramovich's Sibneft corporation was a leading sponsor in the mid-2000s, and VTB Bank sponsored the shirts from 2006 to 2008. Adidas supplied the kit through the 1980s. Umbro took over in 1991, and Nike supplied it in 1995 and 1996.
The club once had its own small ground, the Light-Athletic Football Complex CSKA, known as LFK CSKA. It holds no more than 4,600 spectators, which is tiny for a club of this stature.
Between 1961 and 2000, CSKA played its home games at the Grigory Fedotov Stadium. That ground was demolished in 2007, and construction of Arena CSKA began the same year. While waiting, the team played most of its home games at the Arena Khimki and the Luzhniki Stadium.
After several delays, the new arena opened on the 10th of September 2016. On the 28th of February 2017, CSKA announced it had sold the naming rights to VEB.RF, and the 30,000-capacity ground became the VEB Arena. In 2018 the club decided to play its home Champions League matches at the Luzhniki Stadium instead.
On the 13th of December 2019, the state-owned development corporation VEB.RF announced it would take control of more than 75 percent of the club's shares. Those shares had been put up as collateral by the previous owners to finance the VEB Arena.
A racecourse in Moscow, the old hippodrome, was the site of the club's first stadium, and it gave the team its nickname of Horses. At first the label was considered offensive. Over time it became The Horses, and players and fans now use it as a name. Other nicknames are Army Men and Red-Blues.
Spartak Moscow is the club's main rival. Friendships are wide, though. CSKA fans keep good relations with supporters of Partizan in Serbia, PAOK in Greece, CSKA Sofia in Bulgaria, Widzew Łódź and Ruch Chorzów in Poland, and Steaua București in Romania. They also get on with fellow Russian fans of Dynamo Moscow.
The list of famous supporters runs to 25 names. Among them are Vladimir Vysotsky, Maya Plisetskaya, Yegor Letov and Andrei Grechko.
Two shirt numbers are retired. Number 12 belongs to the club supporters, the twelfth man. Number 16 honours the goalkeeper Serhiy Perkhun, a posthumous honour dated 2001.
The women's team has a separate story. It was founded in 1990 and competed at the second level of the Soviet Championship. After the Soviet Union dissolved, it registered in the Russian Supreme Division, where it competed for two seasons before it folded.
In 2016 a new side was registered as CSKA, after Zorky Krasnogorsk disbanded near the end of the 2015 Top Division and FK Rossiyanka filled its vacancy. Its first game, a 1-1 draw against Chertanovo, fell on the 93rd anniversary of the club's first football match. It ended that championship second-to-last.
In July 2017, during the summer pause, the team became an official CSKA section. Two months later it won its first title, beating Chertanovo 1-0 in the Russian Cup final. It then won the Russian championship in 2019 and 2020 and made its debut in the UEFA Women's Champions League.
In the men's record book, Vágner Love ranks second among the top scorers, with two spells at the club, in 2004-2011 and again in 2013. Valentin Nikolayev, who played from 1940 to 1952, is third.
The appearances list is led by Igor Akinfeev, followed by Sergei Ignashevich and Vasili Berezutski. Akinfeev's span is recorded as 2003 to present, so his count is still open.
Updated
Common questions
What does CSKA stand for?
CSKA comes from the historical Russian name meaning Central Sports Club of the Army. The football department itself has used the name PFC CSKA Moscow since 1994.
When did CSKA Moscow win a European trophy?
On the 18th of May 2005, CSKA beat Sporting CP 3-1 in the UEFA Cup final in Lisbon. It was the first time a Russian club had won a European competition.
Why was the army club disbanded in the 1950s?
After the Soviet national team, built around CDSA players, lost a replay to Yugoslavia at the 1952 Helsinki Olympics, CDSA withdrew from the league and was disbanded. The club was re-established in 1954 on the initiative of Defense Minister Nikolai Bulganin.
Who owns CSKA Moscow?
In 2012 the Ministry of Defence sold its 24.94 percent stake to Bluecastle Enterprises Ltd, which has owned 100 percent of the club since. On the 13th of December 2019, VEB.RF announced it would take control of more than 75 percent of shares pledged as collateral for the VEB Arena financing.
Why is CSKA nicknamed the Horses?
The club's first stadium was built on the site of an old racecourse in Moscow. The nickname was once considered offensive but is now used by players and fans, alongside Army Men and Red-Blues.
How many top-flight titles has CSKA won?
The honours list shows 13 titles in the Soviet Top League and Russian Premier League combined, the first in 1946 and the most recent in 2015-16.
All sources
102 references cited across the entry
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- 2NewsНа чем зарабатывает президент ЦСКА Евгений Гинер: "Новые Лужники", новые офисы, СП с госкомпаниями, но главный актив – хорошая репутацияИрина Грузинова et al. — 31 July 2016
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- 22Ивица Олич — главный тренер ПФК ЦСКА!PFC CSKA Moscow — 23 March 2021
- 23Ивица Олич покидает ПФК ЦСКАPFC CSKA Moscow — 15 June 2021
- 24Алексей Березуцкий утвержден главным тренером ПФК ЦСКАPFC CSKA Moscow — 19 July 2021
- 26US economic sanctions hit Russian top flight side CSKA MoscowDiario AS — 23 February 2022
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- 76Топ-20 знаменитых армейских болельщиков27 May 2010
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