Football in Romania
The Romanian football pyramid has 4 tiers, the top tier is Liga I which is made up of fully professional teams whilst the second tier, Liga II contains both pro and semi-pro teams. Below that at Liga III and Liga IV the leagues are regionalised to avoid lengthy travel for lower teams.
Pyramid Structure – Champions, Promotion and Relegation
Liga I contains 16 teams and each team initially plays each other home and away, totalling 30 games and then the league splits into two playoffs, Championship and relegation. In these playoffs the regular season points are carried over but halved, and goal differences are erased.
The top 6 enter the championship playoffs and play each other home and away once more. The team at the top of the table at the end of this is crowned the Liga I champion.
The relegation playoffs feature the remaining 10 teams who play each other just one more time, either home or away. The bottom two from this group are relegated to Liga II whilst the third bottom team plays a one of playoff against the team ranked 3rd in Liga II.
Liga II contains 20 teams, and each team plays each other home and away totalling a 38-game season. The top 2 teams are automatically promoted, whilst the 3rd ranked team enter the aforementioned playoff. The bottom two are relegated to Liga III where they enter the rationalised system.
European Qualification
Being ranked just 26th in the EUFA coefficient rankings Romania have only one Champions League third qualifying spot which goes to the Liga I champions.
There are also 3 Europa League places which go to the winner of the Cupa României, the second placed team in Liga I and either the 3rd or 4th placed side in Liga I depending on the winners of the cup.
Liga I
FCSB have also won the top league in Romania way more than any other team, with a total of 26. Next comes Dinamo Bucharest with 18. In 3rd place is Venus Bucharest with 8, who last won the league way back in 1940 and now play amateur football.