1997–98 A Group

A Group
Season	1997–98
Dates	2 August 1997 – 10 May 1998
Champions	Litex Lovech; (1st title)
Relegated	Olimpik; Spartak Pleven; Etar;
Champions League	Litex
UEFA Cup	CSKA
Matches played	240
Goals scored	696 (2.9 per match)
Top goalscorer	Boncho Genchev; Anton Spasov; (17 goals each)
	← 1996–97 1998–99 →

The 1997–98 A Group was the 50th season of the A Football Group, the top Bulgarian professional league for association football clubs, since its establishment in 1948.

Overview

It was contested by 16 teams, and Litex Lovech won the championship.

League standings

Pos	Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification or relegation
1	Litex Lovech (C)	30	21	6	3	73	25	+48	69	Qualification for Champions League first qualifying round
2	Levski Sofia	30	19	7	4	73	27	+46	64	Qualification for Cup Winners' Cup qualifying round
3	CSKA Sofia	30	18	7	5	71	29	+42	61	Qualification for UEFA Cup first qualifying round
4	Neftochimic Burgas	30	17	4	9	59	31	+28	55
5	Slavia Sofia	30	15	9	6	51	30	+21	54
6	Levski Kyustendil	30	15	1	14	45	40	+5	46
7	Spartak Varna	30	12	6	12	42	36	+6	42	Qualification for Intertoto Cup first round
8	Minyor Pernik	30	12	5	13	32	35	−3	41
9	Lokomotiv Sofia	30	11	6	13	42	40	+2	39
10	Metalurg Pernik	30	11	4	15	28	36	−8	37
11	Botev Plovdiv	30	11	3	16	35	48	−13	36
12	Dobrudzha Dobrich	30	11	3	16	33	55	−22	36
13	Lokomotiv Plovdiv	30	11	3	16	31	58	−27	36
14	Olimpik Galata (R)	30	11	2	17	26	47	−21	35	Relegation to 1998–99 B Group
15	Spartak Pleven (R)	30	7	0	23	32	75	−43	21
16	Etar Veliko Tarnovo (R)	30	4	2	24	21	82	−61	14

Source: rsssf.com
(C) Champions; (R) Relegated

Results

Home \ Away	BOT	CSK	DOB	ETA	LVK	LEV	LIT	LPL	LSO	MET	MIN	NEF	OLI	SLA	SPL	SPV
Botev Plovdiv		3–1	1–0	5–1	0–0	2–4	2–3	1–0	2–1	1–0	3–0	0–3	2–1	1–1	4–0	2–0
CSKA Sofia	3–0		4–1	5–1	3–1	0–1	1–1	3–1	1–1	2–0	5–0	3–0	5–0	1–1	5–0	2–1
Dobrudzha Dobrich	1–0	1–1		3–0	1–0	1–4	1–1	2–0	0–5^[a]	1–0	1–0	0–0	4–2	1–0	4–0	2–0
Etar Veliko Tarnovo	1–0	0–2	1–2		1–4	0–3	1–3	2–1	0–3	1–0	0–1	1–3	1–1	3–4	0–2	1–3
Levski Kyustendil	4–0	1–2	1–0	3–1		1–3	3–0^[b]	2–0	2–0	2–0	3–0	2–1	2–0	2–0	3–1	2–0
Levski Sofia	1–0	3–3	3–1	5–0	4–0		1–1	5–0	1–0	7–0	1–0	2–3	3–0	1–1	3–0	2–1
Litex Lovech	3–0	2–0	3–0	3–0	3–0	0–4^[c]		6–0	3–1	4–0	2–0	1–0	3–0	1–1	4–0	4–0
Lokomotiv Plovdiv	1–0	1–4	2–0	4–1	2–1	1–1	1–3		0–1	3–2	1–0	2–1	1–0	1–1	3–2	1–0
Lokomotiv Sofia	0–0	1–2	4–2	1–0	4–2	0–0	0–3	2–3		2–0	1–0	1–1	3–0	1–2	2–0	1–1
Metalurg Pernik	2–0	1–0	3–0	1–1	3–1	0–0	1–1	2–0	2–1		2–3	1–0	2–0	0–1	3–0	1–0
Minyor Pernik	2–0	2–2	4–0	0–1	2–0	2–1	0–2	1–0	3–0	0–0		1–1	1–0	1–0	3–0	2–1
Neftochimic Burgas	2–0	1–3	4–1	7–0	3–1	3–0	3–2	4–0	4–1	1–0	2–0		5–0	0–1	4–1	0–0
Olimpik Galata	0–1	0–0	1–0	2–0	1–0	2–1	2–4	2–0	2–0	1–0	2–1	3–1		0–2	2–1	2–0
Slavia Sofia	5–3	2–3	3–1	4–0	3–1	2–2	1–2	2–2	2–1	1–0	1–1	2–0	4–0		3–0	0–1
Spartak Pleven	4–2	0–3	5–1	4–1	0–1	2–5	1–4	2–0	1–3	0–1	2–1	1–3	1–0	0–1		1–3
Spartak Varna	4–0	2–1	3–1	3–1	2–0	1–3	1–1	5–0	1–1	2–1	1–1	1–2	2–0	0–0	3–1

Source: A PFG (in Bulgarian)
Legend: Blue = home team win; Yellow = draw; Red = away team win.
Notes:

^ Match awarded after was abandoned at 65th minute by the result 0–2.
^ Match awarded as Litex Lovech fielded ineligible player Radostin Kishishev (originally finished 0–0).
^ Match awarded as Litex Lovech fielded ineligible player Radostin Kishishev (originally finished 1–1).

Champions

Litex Lovech

Goalkeepers
Vitomir Vutov	28	0(0)
Stoyan Stavrev	02	0(0)

Defenders
Petar Kushev	16	0(2)
Stefan Kolev	21	0(1)
Nikolay Dimitrov	24	0(1)
Dimitar Karadaliev	01	0(0)
Zlatomir Zagorčić	27	0(0)
Ivaylo Petkov	27	0(3)
Radostin Kishishev	05	0(0)
Dimitar Balabanov	06	0(0)
Rosen Kirilov	28	0(0)
Koycho Ivanov	01	0(0)

Midfielders
Rosen Emilov	17	0(1)
Mariyan Todorov	28	0(6)
Stoycho Stoilov	30	0(8)
Daniel Ostrovski	05	0(0)
Dragoljub Simonović	22	0(6)
Ivaylo Petev*	12	0(2)
Veselin Sarbakov	16	0(3)
Emil Tsanev*	02	0(0)

Forwards
Stefan Yurukov*	14	(13)
Dimcho Belyakov*	14	0(5)
Alban Bushi	15	0(4)
Svetoslav Todorov	19	0(9)
Luis Carlos Mota	05	0(1)
Igor Bogdanović	15	0(6)
Metodi Stoynev	08	0(1)

Manager
	Dimitar Dimitrov

Petev, Tsanev, Yurukov and Belyakov left the club during a season.

Top scorers

Rank	Scorer	Club	Goals
1	Anton Spasov	Neftochimic Burgas	17
1	Boncho Genchev	CSKA Sofia	17
3	Stefan Yurukov	Litex Lovech	13
3	Danilo Dončić	Lokomotiv Sofia	13
5	Stanimir Stoilov	Slavia Sofia	12
5	Valentin Stanchev	Spartak Varna	12
7	Ivaylo Andonov	CSKA Sofia	11
8	Aleksandar Aleksandrov	Levski Sofia	10
	Plamen Petrov	Levski Kyustendil
	Georgi Ivanov	Levski Sofia
	Iliya Voynov	Spartak Pleven

Source:1997–98 Top Goalscorers

References

External links

Bulgaria - List of final tables (RSSSF)
1997–98 Statistics of A Group at a-pfg.com

[table_note_1_DOB_LSO0.47343198464878-1] Match awarded after was abandoned at 65th minute by the result 0–2.

[table_note_1_LVK_LIT0.47343198464878-2] Match awarded as Litex Lovech fielded ineligible player Radostin Kishishev (originally finished 0–0).

[table_note_1_LIT_LEV0.47343198464878-3] Match awarded as Litex Lovech fielded ineligible player Radostin Kishishev (originally finished 1–1).

[a]

[b]

[c]

v t e Bulgarian football championship seasons
State Championship (National Football Division)	1924 1925 1926 1927 1928 1929 1930 1931 1932 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1937–38 1938–39 1939–40 1941 1942 1943 1944
Republic Championship	1945 1946 1947 1948
A Group	1948–49 1950 1951 1952 1953 1954 1955 1956 1957 1958 1958–59 1959–60 1960–61 1961–62 1962–63 1963–64 1964–65 1965–66 1966–67 1967–68 1968–69 1969–70 1970–71 1971–72 1972–73 1973–74 1974–75 1975–76 1976–77 1977–78 1978–79 1979–80 1980–81 1981–82 1982–83 1983–84 1984–85 1985–86 1986–87 1987–88 1988–89 1989–90 1990–91 1991–92 1992–93 1993–94 1994–95 1995–96 1996–97 1997–98 1998–99 1999–00 2000–01 2001–02 2002–03 2003–04 2004–05 2005–06 2006–07 2007–08 2008–09 2009–10 2010–11 2011–12 2012–13 2013–14 2014–15 2015–16
First League	2016–17 2017–18 2018–19 2019–20 2020–21 2021–22 2022–23 2023–24 2024–25

v t e 1997–98 in Bulgarian football
Domestic leagues	A Group B Group V Group
Domestic cups	Bulgarian Cup (Final)
European competitions	Champions League UEFA Cup Cup Winners' Cup Intertoto Cup
Related to national team	1998 FIFA World Cup (Qualification Group 5, Group D) Hristo Bonev
List of transfers

v t e 1997–98 in European football (UEFA)
Domestic leagues	Albania Andorra Armenia '97 '98 Austria Azerbaijan Belarus '97 '98 Belgium Bosnia and Herzegovina (Herzeg-Bosnia, Republika Srpska) Bulgaria Croatia Cyprus Czech Republic Denmark England Estonia Faroe Islands '97 '98 Finland '97 '98 France Georgia Germany Greece Hungary Iceland '97 '98 Israel Italy Kazakhstan '97 '98 Latvia '97 '98 Lithuania Luxembourg Macedonia Malta Moldova Netherlands Northern Ireland Norway '97 '98 Poland Portugal Republic of Ireland Romania Russia '97 '98 San Marino Scotland Slovakia Slovenia Spain Sweden '97 '98 Switzerland Turkey Ukraine Wales FR Yugoslavia
Domestic cups	Albania Andorra Armenia Austria Azerbaijan Belarus Belgium Bosnia and Herzegovina Bulgaria Croatia Cyprus Czech Republic Denmark England Estonia Faroe Islands '97 '98 Finland '97 '98 France Georgia Germany Greece Hungary Iceland '97 '98 Israel Italy Latvia '97 '98 Liechtenstein Lithuania Luxembourg Macedonia Malta Moldova Netherlands Northern Ireland Norway '97 '98 Poland Portugal Republic of Ireland Romania Russia San Marino Scotland Slovakia Slovenia Spain Sweden Switzerland Turkey Ukraine Wales FR Yugoslavia
League cups	England Finland '97 '98 France Germany Iceland '97 '98 Israel Northern Ireland Republic of Ireland Scotland Wales
UEFA competitions	Champions League (Qualifying rounds, Group stage, knockout stage, Final) Cup Winners' Cup (Final) UEFA Cup (Final) Intertoto Cup Super Cup