Hebar Pazardzhik

FC Hebar (Bulgarian: Футболен клуб Хебър) is a Bulgarian association football club based in Pazardzhik. The club currently competes in the Second League, the second tier of the Bulgarian football league system.

Founded in 1918, they have played at their current home ground, Georgi Benkovski Stadium, since 1989. Hebar have played a total of three seasons in the top level of Bulgarian football, most recently in 2001. Despite finishing ninth that season, the owners of the club moved it to Petrich, becoming Belasitsa Petrich. Fans from Pazardzhik re-founded the club the same year, starting from the amateur levels. For the majority of its history, the club has played either in the second or third levels of the football pyramid.

History

The current name of the club was chosen in 1979: Hebar-the old Thracian name of the river Maritsa. This is the name that the club has borne for 25 years now. Under this name came the biggest success in the history of the club: participation in the premiership of Bulgaria in 1989/1990, 1991/1992 and 2000/2001.The club has also played 32 seasons in the second division. The team has very devoted supporters, known as the "gravediggers".

The re-founded club, FC Hebar 1918, was formed in July 2015. A year later, Hebar merged with third division club Chiko Byaga.

The beginning

The first events of the football game in Pazardzhik are related to the name of the teacher Dimitar Tsonev, but Georgi Serbezov, who graduated from the French college in Constantinople, made the most significant contribution to the popularization of football in Pazardzhik. As a teacher in his native town of Tatar Pazardzhik, he has been practicing football since 1916 on the field of the military unit called Lagera (now the Swimming Pool Health Zone), the southern bank of the Maritsa River and the meadows and the main promenade of island. Engineer Lazar Vassilev, a student at that time in Prague, brought the first football ball in the city. At the same time