Polonia Warsaw is a football club in Poland, established in 1911. The club is located in Warsaw and has a football and basketball teams. Initially it was a merger of two school teams, was named Polonia and made their debut in a 3-4 loss at Korona. Their local rival is Legia Warsaw, with whom they met for the first time in a 1-1draw in Aril 1917.
The first ever season of the Polish football championship was in 1921 and Polonia was runner-up. Their first champion title came in 1926, but they were joint-champions and the first Polish Championship honor they won in 1946. In 1952 they were the Polish Cup winners. Since then the team faced a decline. The club belonged to the Polish National Railroad company and was renamed to Kolejarz (Railroad worker), but the railroad sponsored Lech Poznań along with Polonia and the latest one was financed worse. So they competed in the lower divisions for 40 years before they won promotion to the top flight in 1992/93. At that time the team wasn’t strong enough to compete in the top division and by the end of the season they were relegated.
In the 1995/96 season they promoted and in 1996 Janusz Romanowski became the team’s chairman. In 1998 they finished the season runners-up and in 1999/2000 Polonia won the league title at the expense of Legia Warszawa, whom they beat in the final 3-0. In 2000/01 the team won the Polish Cup, in 2000 they were Polish SuperCup and Polish League Cup holders.
In 2006 the owner of JW Construction, Józef Wojciechowski, became the team’s owner nevertheless they faced relegation by the end of the season. The team failed to reach promotion and in July 2008 they merged with Dyskobolia Grodzisk Wielkopolsk thus they were promoted. The 2008/09 season Polonia finished fourth and that allowed them to enter the third qualification round of the Europa League.
In the 2009/10 season José Mari Bakero was appointed the head coach. He managed to save the team from relegation, though they were close to it. In 2010 Bakero left his position and after that several managers changed but no one could improve the situation. In July 2012 Polonia Warsaw was bought by Ireneusz Król but went bankrupt a year later.
They were expelled from Ekstraklasa and downclassed to the semi-professional 6th tier.
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