HNK
Rijeka is a Croatian football club, from Rijeka on the Croatian coast.
The club was founded in 1946 as "Kvarner" and in this early period it had
moderate success in various Yugoslav and local club championships. It
changed its name to "Rijeka" on June 3, 1954, and advanced to the Yugoslav
First League in the 1957/58 season. It remained in the top tier until the
1969/70 season, when it was demoted to the Second League. It was topping
that league but it still took it until 1973/74 to return to the First League,
where it would remain all the way until the breakup of Yugoslavia, by and
large among the top ten clubs.
Rijeka also won the Yugoslav Cup in 1978 and 1979 and was a runner-up in
1987, and participated several times in various UEFA championships, though
overall rather unsuccessfully.
Rijeka has been playing in the Croatian First League since the independence
of the country in 1991, generally finishing near the top. It has also played
in the Croatian Cup finals in 1994 and participated in the qualifications to
the UEFA Cup.
The club's stadium, Kantrida, can hold 22,000 spectators. The fans are known
as "Armada". |
