What’s the smallest team to ever play in the Champions League?

Teams from Cyprus, Moldova and Romania have played in the Champions League, but which is the smallest team?

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[ezraezra]

Let's not forget that Sheriff Tiraspol's win over Real Madrid was even a big surprise when it comes to club's history. Sheriff were founded in 1997, only 24 years at that time when the UCL upset happened, while Real Madrid would go on to win that season's competition for the 14th time after that shock loss (and also won the Double with La Liga).

[damianbla]

Interesting fact:
Unirea Urziceni's coach, Dan Petrescu, previously coached Polish club Wisła Kraków. He ordered the footballers to train as hard as in the civilised Western clubs. But the footballers were lazy and refused it. The director of Wisła Kraków had to choose: to sack all the footballers or to sack one coach. So he sacked this one coach - Dan Petrescu.

Dan Petrescu went from Wisła Kraków directly to Unirea Urziceni. There the footballers trained hard and in their first season under Dan Petrescu they win the Romanian League and qualified for the UEFA Champions League.

Meanwhile the Polish League had to wait from 1997 to 2016 to get the Polish club in the Champions League...

[raresdumitras]

Unirea Urziceni has an interesting history. They started as a small backyard team in the Romanian lower divisions. I remember them from a news story in the late 2000s as a third division team known for its good facilities (they had a billiard table for their players). Their owner was a mysterious business man who avoided the press and never gave interviews. The season they played the Champions league they owned the most talented football players. They were the Romanian version of Nottingham forest.

[richardoh]

Seeing Zenit and Shakhtar being in the same group in 2011 feels way too awkward now

[TheForesking]

If we’re talking about general European competitions, KÍ is one of the craziest stories; a team from the town of Klaskvík (population of 5000 people) in the Faroe Islands. Their stadium is so small (2600 capacity - of which only 1300 is seating) that they had to play their games in the capital city Tórshavn.

The team almost managed to qualify to the Champions League in 2023 after beating Ferencváros and BK Häcken in the qualifiers, but falling short against Molde and Sheriff Tiraspol in CL and EL last round of qualifiers. They became the first ever Faeroese team to make it to a European tournament by qualifying to the Conference League.

[SneakySneasel]

At this point what Romanian club hasn't been dissolved?

[JanJezierski]

I thought this was going to be about literally smallest teams height-wise

[Khoalinski]

Sheriff Tiraspol's goalkeeper was literally something else in that match, bro's a monster. I still remember that match to this day (He only conceded a goal from Benzema's penalty kick) but his team got the last-minute goal and won. That match shocked me and is living rent-free in my brain.

[AlinPrisecaru]

Really cool to hear about Urziceni again. It's a city close to Bucharest and everytime I pass through it I get flashbacks of that season. It was surreal to see them in the UCL knowing they just appeared in our 1st division. Thanks for the clip!

[edvinfifa]

This might not be related. For the most successful team in Europe hailing from a small city, it has to be Villarreal. A city of only 50k having such a massive team is very impressive

[coolawesomemax]

Team from cyprus in the champions league is crazy lol

[singo-YT]

You failed to mention Tiraspol are also based in a breakaway state of Transnistria/Pridnestrovia which would make them the only team from that nation to make it to the competition

[ComradeDany]

As a Moldavian i'm still proud of that victory against Real Madrid.

[joroplayer]

Ludogorets from Bulgaria comes from a town with 35k population.

[AlfredoPuente]

Villarreal is the smallest team to ever win the Europa League, the whole city would fit in Old Trafford.

[mikelytou]

1. I like this new approach of naming contenders.
2. Damn, that is a shame. From almost surviving the CL group stage to dissolution in less than 2 years.
How is that even possible?

[eliterrr]

Fc kuusysi from Lahti, Finland (their name translates to fc sixty-nine). They were in the ucl before the rebranding, they were knocked out by the eventual champions, steua bucaresti, who beat fc barcelona on penalties in the 1986 ucl final.

Anyway kuusysi is a relatively small team from Finland and is one of the smallest ever teams in ucl history, considering that before the 90’s, football in Finland was relatively poor.

[Mr.Dimitrie]

Also Unirea Urziceni is one of the only 4 romanian teams that have qualified in the UCL (old/new format since 1993) along side FCSB, CFR Cluj and Oțelul Galați.

[drunkenhobo]

0:54 - Somewhat ominous that both teams who failed to qualify were dissolved within three years!

[twk]

I couldn't care less about football but these videos intrigue me so much and I cannot stop watching them.