Dunarea Calarasi

Football made its appearance in the city from the Danube banks in 1919, with the founding of Ialomița Călărași, an amateur club that quickly became the main attraction of Sunday events—a day when the whole community gathered to enjoy their free time. In the following decades, other amateur clubs such as Tricolorul, Venus, FC Călărași, and Energia emerged and contributed to the development of local football. This steady evolution culminated in 1962, with the founding of the city’s first professional club, Celuloza Călărași.

Appearing quite late on the Romanian football scene, Celuloza did not have a rapid rise but grew steadily, year after year. In its first six years of existence, the club competed in the Bucharest Regional Championship. At the end of the 1967–68 season, Celuloza finished 1st in the East Series of the regional championship and was promoted to Divizia C.

In the third division, Celuloza competed in Series III and finished the 1968–69 season in 11th place, ensuring its presence in the following season as well. Over the next two seasons, the team achieved very good results, finishing 5th in 1969–70 and 9th in 1970–71. In 1971–72, Celuloza moved to Series IV and finished 5th once again. Then came a sensational 1972–73 season in Series V, at the end of which Celuloza was promoted for the first time in its history to Divizia B, securing promotion with an eight-point lead over Autobuzul București.

First Divizia B season was a good one for the Vlachs, which ended on the 11th place, result followed by other good rankings in the next seasons: 1974–75 – 8th and 1975–76 – 11th, then a seasons in which the team saved from relegation with some emotions: 1976–77 – 14th and finally Celuloza relegated back to Divizia C at the end of 1977–78, when the club finished only on the 15th place. After relegation Celuloza tried to fight for promotion, but failed, ending only on the 4th place.

In August 1979, Celuloza changed its name to Dunărea (lit. 'The Danube'), a name considered more representative and closer to the hearts of the spectators. The change also brought renewed ambition, with the primary goal being a return to the second division.

In its first season under the new name, Dunărea finished only in 3rd place, under the guidance of Ion Merlan. The squad included, among others, Niculescu, Răuță, Andrei, Boțoroagă, Dan Cristea, G. Voicu, Roibu, Alexandru Tănase, Marin Ștefan I, Marian Catană, Gheorghe Alexandru, Vasiluț, Ion Baraitaru, G. Pană, C. Ștefan, I. Dumitru, N. Nicolae, Victor Stelian, Aurel Ivan, N. Duma, and Marin Ștefan II.

Promotion came a year later, when the Vlachs, under the leadership of Ion Păunescu, achieved their goal. The team retained several key players from the previous season and added others such as Tudor, Isacov, Țuțuianu, V. Nicolae, Budac, D. Panciu, Cernica, Constantin, and Mihai. With this group, Dunărea secured promotion with an eight-point lead over Portul Constanța, the same margin as in their previous promotion.

First Divizia B season, after the comeback, was a very good one, Dunărea finishing 7th out of 18, but the team could not keep their form relegating at the end of the 1983–84 season, finishing the last one, with only 22 points.

Returned to Divizia C, Dunărea promoted after a single season. Led by Vlad Marica and with players such as Petrișor Toma, Mocanu — Isacov, Berean, Mihăilă. M. Ștefan, Pană, Voicu, Marin, Vîlcu, Tănase — Virgil Bogatu, Mircea Banu, Valentin Nicolae, Zamfir, Gheorghe Vlase, Savu — Constantin Ștefan, Nelu Farin, S. Farin, Țuțuianu, Marian Catană and Panciu, the yellow and blues finished 1st, with 7 points ahead of Chimia Victoria Buzău.

Dunărea relegated then after only one season in Divizia B, finishing only on 16th place. After these seasons Dunărea started to be considered a team, somewhere between Divizia B and Divizia C, a reputation that followed the club throughout its existence. For the 1986–87 season the club name was changed to Oțelul and the team finished on 3rd place, then from 1987 the club has returned to the old name, Dunărea, auspicious change, the team promoting back into the second league at the end of the 1987–88 season. After only one season in Divizia B, Dunărea relegated again to Divizia C.

The yellow and blues continued their oscillating results finishing 8th at the end of 1989–90 Divizia C season, then promoting back to Divizia B, but only at the end of the 1991–92 season, season in which the club obtained the best performance in its entire history, a Cupa României quarter-final, being eliminated by Politehnica Timișoara, a team from Divizia A by 1–0 win at home and 0–2 lost away. In that edition, Politehnica Timișoara played the cup final against Steaua București. To qualify in the Quarter-finals, the team eliminated Gloria Bistriţa also a team from Divizia A by 3–2 and after they won against ASA 1962 Târgu Mureș, another team from Divizia A, by 2–1. In Divizia C table Dunărea was deducted 4 points and finally missed the promotion from financial reasons and changed its name again in the summer of 1992, this time to Sportul. Two seasons played the team under this name: 1992–93 – 4th and 1993–94 – 2nd. From the summer of 1994 the team changed back its name to Dunărea and promoted back to Divizia B after 5 seasons, finishing 2nd at 8 points from Oțelul Târgoviște and 6 points ahead of Astra Ploiești.

The Vlachs remained at this level for 3 seasons: 1995–96 – 10th, 1996–97 – 9th and 1997–98 – 17th.

After relegation, Dunărea struggled to come back, but without much success, following the darkest period in the history of the club with 17 years in the Liga III without any season in the Liga II and with some financial problems also, around 2005.

Between 1998 and 2005, due to poor financial situation Dunărea began to blaze somewhere in the middle of the third league rankings: 1998–99 – 13th, 1999–2000 – 7th, 2000–01 – 8th, 2001–02 – 6th, 2002–03 – 7th and 2003–04 – 8th. In 2005 there has been a restructuring of the club from a legal and even financial point of view and the results have begun to appear: 2004–05 – 3rd and 2005–06 – 2nd. But after this short period in which the club showed that it can fight for promotion, followed a new period of contrasting results: 2006–07 – 8th, 2007–08 – 13th, 2008–09 – 6th, 2009–10 – 8th, 2010–11 – 4th, 2011–12 – 12th. In this period Dunărea did not seem to have a serious goal, except to stay somewhere in the upper part of the Liga III and even the bringing of Ion Moldovan, an experienced coach, in 2007 didn't resolve too much.

From 2012 the yellow and blues started to look again as a team that is capable to promote with 2 4th place in the 2012–13 and 2013–14 seasons. In 2015 the ex-international player Ionel Ganea was hired as the new manager of the team and with important players for this level, like: Constantin Bumbac and Valentin Alexandru the team achieved, at the end of the season, the promotion to Liga II after 17 years of waiting.

After the promotion Dunărea made an exceptional first Liga II season and finished on the 2nd place, at only three points from the leader, Rapid București and qualified for the promotion play-off where it played against 2nd place from the second series of Liga II, UTA Arad. In the first match, played at Călărași Dunărea won 3-1 and the dream of Liga I was more present than ever, on the banks of the Danube, but the second match of the play-off was a nightmare, the Vlachs lost 1–4 at Arad and remained in the Liga II for another season. Also during this season Ionel Ganea was changed with another ex-international player, Adrian Mihalcea.

2016–17 Liga II season has brought major changes, going to the one-series format, in this situation Dunărea made a season more than honorable and finished on the 7th place, out of 20. In the summer of 2017 Adrian Mihalcea was changed with Adrian Iencsi and Iencsi after only one round with Dan Alexa. After Alexa's arrival, the team has returned miraculously and from a team of last places entered in the winter break from the 1st place, 1 point ahead of 2nd place, FC Hermannstadt and 7 points ahead of 3rd place Chindia Târgoviște. This was possible after an incredible series of 18 matches without losing, the dream of promotion being more real than ever. The second part of the season was just a continuation of the first part, Dunărea reaching a record of 32 matches without losing, including 13 winning matches in a row. Despite the fact that the direct opponent, FC Hermannstadt, was also a tough team, with a record of 34 matches without losing, and also the runners-up of the 2017–18 Cupa României, the Vlachs managed to finish 1st earning the first trophy in the history of the club and also the first personalized trophy of the Liga II. This performance has ensured their promotion in the Liga I, the first in the history of the club and the Călărași County.