KF Partizani Tirana
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| FK Partizani Tirana | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Full name | Futboll Klub Partizani Tirana | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Founded | February 4th, 1946 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Ground | Qemal Stafa stadium, Tirana, Albania | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Capacity | 19,200 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Chairman |  Albert Xhani |
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| Manager | Hasan Lika |
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| League | Albanian First Division | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 2006/07 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Futboll Klub (or Klubi Sportiv) Partizani is an Albanian football club, playing in the capital, Tirana, and founded in 1946. Their first participation in the Albanian National Championship was in 1947.
It is regarded as one of Albania's top teams having won:
- National Championship 15 times
(1947, 1948, 1949, 1954, 1957, 1958, 1959, 1961, 1962-63, 1963-64, 1970-71, 1978-79, 1980-81, 1986-87, 1992-93),
- Albanian Second Division: 1
(2000-01)
- Albanian Cup: 15
(1948, 1949, 1957, 1958, 1961, 1964, 1966, 1968, 1970, 1973, 1980, 1991, 1993, 1997, 2004)
(1994, 2004)
Under the communist regime all the sporting clubs were owned by the Albanian State. Partizani was run by the Ministry of Defence, from its foundation until 1990. Its main rivals were Dinamo run by the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and 17 Nëntori (present-day SK Tirana) run by the Tirana City Hall.
KF Partizani became the first club to be privatized in Albania. The experience was not a positive one however, the club ran into economic difficulties and into a legal dispute over the club ownership. While the two arguing sides were settling their dispute in court, the club ended the 1999-2000 season in 14th and last place in the league dropping to the second division for the first time in their history. The court finally ruled in favor of Albert Xhani who also took over the role of team president, a position he still retains. Partizani went on to win the Albanian Second Division title and get back to be a contender for the following National Championship titles. Partizani is the only privately owned team in Albania, which also means that they do not have their own stadium, as all stadiums are owned by the respective City Halls. The other teams are mostly owned by the City Halls but supported by private donors, who usually carry out the role of president.
Partizani plays at the Selman Stërmasi stadium (which is home stadium to SK Tirana) and national stadium Qemal Stafa which have a capacity of 12,000 and 19,200 respectively.
In 1962-63, the club participated in a European Cup competition for the first time. The most memorable matches in the European scene have been the 1-0 win in Tirana aganist Torino in the Cup Winners Cup on Septmber 18th, 1968, the 1-0 win in Tirana against Celtic in the Champions League on September 19th, 1979 and the tough elimination against Feyenoord in 1991 with a 0-0 tie at home and an 1-0 loss away with a goal in the 86th minute. In the 2003-04 season, the club finished fourth in the Albanian Premier League. In the 2004-05 season, they participated in the UEFA Cup, but were eliminated in the second qualifying round by Hapoel Bnei Sakhnin FC 6-1 on aggregate.
[edit] Current Squad
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