Latvian Higher League or Virslīga is a professional football league and the top tier of association football in

Latvia Latvia ( or ; lv, Latvija ; ltg, Latveja; liv, Leţmō), officially the Republic of Latvia ( lv, Latvijas Republika, links=no, ltg, Latvejas Republika, links=no, liv, Leţmō Vabāmō, links=no), is a country in the Baltic region of ...

. Organised by the Latvian Football Federation, the Higher League is contested by 10 clubs. The full name of the league is Optibet Virslīga for sponsorship reasons since 2019.

History and league format

History

The first all-national Latvian championship, which succeeded the Riga Football League and other regional leagues, was organized in 1927, which lasted until the

Soviet occupation of Latvia in 1940 The Soviet occupation of Latvia in 1940 refers to the military occupation of the Republic of Latvia by the Soviet Union under the provisions of the 1939 Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact with Nazi Germany and its Secret Additional Protocol signed in ...

. After

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

, between 1945 and 1991 the championship of Soviet Latvia was the main footballing competition in the

Latvian SSR The Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic (Latvian SSR), also known as Soviet Latvia or simply Latvia, was a federated republic within the Soviet Union, and formally one of its 16 (later 15) constituent Republics of the Soviet Union, republics. Th ...

. With Latvia regaining full independence in August 1991, the newly established Latvian Football Federation (LFF) decided to reorganise its competitions within the Virslīga from 1992. The same year Latvia returned to

FIFA FIFA (; stands for ''Fédération Internationale de Football Association'' (French), meaning International Association Football Federation ) is the international governing body of association football, beach football and futsal. It was found ...

and became a member of

UEFA Union of European Football Associations (UEFA ; french: Union des associations européennes de football; german: Union der europäischen Fußballverbände) is one of six continental bodies of governance in association football. It governs fo ...

Format

After the 2007 season the league increased from eight to ten sides. In 2008 each side played the others four times. From 2015 till 2018 there were eight participating clubs. This was increased to nine for the 2019 season and ten for the 2020 season. At the end of the season, the lowest placed team are automatically relegated into 1. līga, and the winner of the 1. līga automatically takes their place. The second lowest placed team in Virslīga and the second team of 1. līga play two matches for a place in the Virslīga the following season. The winner of Virslīga, the champion of Latvia, plays in the UEFA Champions League qualifying round. The second and third placed clubs play in the UEFA Europa League qualifying games. A winter off-season league cup, the Virslīga Winter Cup, was played in January of each year from 2013 to 2017, which was replaced in 2018 by the Virslīga Cup (). There again will be 10 teams in 2022 season. Last year participant
RFSValmiera FCFK LiepājaRiga FCFK Spartaks JūrmalaBFC Daugavpils
an
FK Metta
will be joined by newcomer
FK Auda
FK Tukums 2000/Telms and

SK Super Nova SK Super Nova is a Latvian association football club currently playing in the Virslīga Latvian Higher League or Virslīga is a professional football league and the top tier of association football in Latvia. Organised by the Latvian Footba ...

Sponsorships and name changes

The League has changed sponsors for several times. From 2005 until 2010 it was known as the LMT Virslīga. No sponsorships were established for the 2011 season. Starting from the 2012 season, the league was reorganised in partnership with an NGO as "Latvijas Futbola virslīga", adopting the NGO's name in the 2012 season. From 2013 to 2015, the league was known as the SMScredit.lv Virslīga due to a contract with the online microfinance company SMScredit. In March 2016, it was announced that the Virslīga would be sponsored by SynotTip Sports Bar on a three-year contract. They were succeeded by

betting Gambling (also known as betting or gaming) is the wagering of something of value ("the stakes") on a random event with the intent of winning something else of value, where instances of strategy are discounted. Gambling thus requires three elem ...

firm Optibet on a two-year contract, beginning with the 2019 season.

Clubs (2022)

Titles by year

Source:

Riga Football League

* 1908 British FC * 1909 RV Union * 1910 RV Union * 1911 Britannia FC * 1912 RV Union * 1913 SV Kaiserwald * 1914 Britannia FC * 1915 Britannia FC

Latvian Championship 1922–1940 (independent)

* 1922 Kaiserwald Riga * 1923 Kaiserwald Riga * 1924 RFK Riga * 1925 RFK Riga * 1926 RFK Riga * 1927 Olimpia Liepaja * 1928 Olimpia Liepaja * 1929 Olimpia Liepaja * 1930 RFK Riga * 1931 RFK Riga * 1932

ASK Riga ASK Rīga is a former professional basketball club that was based in Riga, Latvia. "ASK" stood for "Armijas Sporta Klubs" (in English: Army Sports Club). History BK Rīga was then founded in 2004, and it got back the original name of ASK R ...

* 1933 Olimpia Liepaja * 1934 RFK Riga * 1935 RFK Riga * 1936 Olimpia Liepaja * 1937 ''Not Played'' * 1938 Olimpia Liepaja * 1939 Olimpia Liepaja * 1940 RFK Riga

Football Championship of Latvian SSR 1942–1990

* 1942

* 1944

Since independence in 1991

*1991 Skonto Riga *1992 Skonto Riga *1993 Skonto Riga *1994 Skonto Riga *1995 Skonto Riga *1996 Skonto Riga *1997 Skonto Riga *1998 Skonto Riga *1999 Skonto Riga *2000 Skonto Riga *2001 Skonto Riga *2002 Skonto Riga *2003 Skonto Riga *2004 Skonto Riga *2005 Liepajas Metalurgs *2006

FK Ventspils FK Ventspils is a Latvian football club, based at Ventspils Olimpiskais Stadions in Ventspils city and is one of the most popular football clubs in the country. The club played in the Latvian Virsliga since 1997. It was abolished in 2020, but has ...

*2007

*2008

*2009 Liepajas Metalurgs *2010 Skonto Riga *2011

*2012 Daugava Daugavpils *2013

*2014

*2015 FK Liepaja *2016 JPFS/FK Spartaks Jurmala *2017 JPFS/FK Spartaks Jurmala *

2018 File:2018 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2018 Winter Olympics opening ceremony in PyeongChang, South Korea; Protests erupt following the Assassination of Jamal Khashoggi; March for Our Lives protests take place across the United ...

Riga FC *

2019 File:2019 collage v1.png, From top left, clockwise: Hong Kong protests turn to widespread riots and civil disobedience; House of Representatives votes to adopt articles of impeachment against Donald Trump; CRISPR gene editing first used to experim ...

Riga FC *

2020 2020 was heavily defined by the COVID-19 pandemic, which led to global social and economic disruption, mass cancellations and postponements of events, worldwide lockdowns and the largest economic recession since the Great Depression in t ...

Riga FC *

2021 File:2021 collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: the James Webb Space Telescope was launched in 2021; Protesters in Yangon, Myanmar following the coup d'état; A civil demonstration against the October 2021 coup in Sudan; Crowd shortly after t ...

RFS *

2022 File:2022 collage V1.png, Clockwise, from top left: Road junction at Yamato-Saidaiji Station several hours after the assassination of Shinzo Abe; Anti-government protest in Sri Lanka in front of the Presidential Secretariat; The global monkeypo ...

Valmiera Valmiera (; german: link=no, Wolmar; pl, Wolmar see other names) is the largest city of the historical Vidzeme region, Latvia, with a total area of . As of 2002, Valmiera had a population of 27,323, and in 2020 – 24 879. It is a state cit ...

Notable managers and players

File:Aleksandrs_Starkovs.jpg, Aleksandrs Starkovs has won 12 league titles since independence with Skonto as a manager. File:Roman_Hryhorchuk_11.08.2013.1.jpg, Three times winner with

Ventspils Ventspils (; german: Windau, ; see other names) is a state city in northwestern Latvia in the historical Courland region of Latvia, and is the sixth largest city in the country. At the beginning of 2020, Ventspils had a population of 33,906. It ...

Ukrainian

Roman Hryhorchuk Roman Yosypovych Hryhorchuk ( uk, Роман Йосипович Григорчук; born 22 March 1965) is a Ukrainian football manager who is the head coach of Chornomorets Odesa and a former player. Playing career He started playing with Lys ...

is the first manager who reached Europa League group stage in Virslīga history. File:Māris_Verpakovskis.jpg, First-ever Latvian who scored in

Euros The euro (symbol: €; code: EUR) is the official currency of 19 out of the member states of the European Union (EU). This group of states is known as the eurozone or, officially, the euro area, and includes about 340 million citizens . Th ...

Māris Verpakovskis has won league titles with both Skonto and

Liepāja Liepāja (; liv, Līepõ; see other names) is a state city in western Latvia, located on the Baltic Sea. It is the largest-city in the Kurzeme Region and the third-largest city in the country after Riga and Daugavpils. It is an important ice-f ...

. File:Marians_Pahars.jpg, Ukrainian born Marians Pahars has won 5 league titles before moving to

Southampton Southampton () is a port city in the ceremonial county of Hampshire in southern England. It is located approximately south-west of London and west of Portsmouth. The city forms part of the South Hampshire built-up area, which also covers Po ...

. File:Viktor_Skripnik.jpg,

Bundesliga The Bundesliga (; ), sometimes referred to as the Fußball-Bundesliga () or 1. Bundesliga (), is a professional association football league in Germany. At the top of the German football league system, the Bundesliga is Germany's primary footb ...

winner Ukrainian

Viktor Skrypnyk Viktor Anatoliyovych Skrypnyk ( uk, Віктор Анатолійович Скрипник; born 19 November 1969) is a Ukrainian former professional footballer and current manager of Vorskla Poltava. As a player, he helped Werder Bremen to the l ...

has won league title with

Riga Riga (; lv, Rīga , liv, Rīgõ) is the capital and largest city of Latvia and is home to 605,802 inhabitants which is a third of Latvia's population. The city lies on the Gulf of Riga at the mouth of the Daugava river where it meets the ...

as a manager. File:Aleksandrs Koliņko.jpg,

Aleksandrs Koliņko Aleksandrs Koliņko (born 18 June 1975) is a Latvian retired professional footballer who works as assistant manager and goalkeeping coach of Latvian Higher League club FK RFS. Club career Koliņko was born in Riga and started his career in 1994 ...

, best known for playing for

Crystal Palace Crystal Palace may refer to: Places Canada * Crystal Palace Complex (Dieppe), a former amusement park now a shopping complex in Dieppe, New Brunswick * Crystal Palace Barracks, London, Ontario * Crystal Palace (Montreal), an exhibition building ...

has won 6 league titles totally with Skonto as a player and Spartaks as an assistant manager.

Most titles

This is a list of clubs, in order of most titles won in championships in independent Latvia (1922–1940 and 1991 to date). Teams in bold are part of 2020 Virslīga. Virsliga 2008 Ventspils

By club

Rivalries

The most well-known rivalry is the Kurzeme Derby (Kurzemes derbijs) between

and

. The two biggest clubs in Kurzeme have played 86 matches between themselves with a record of 31–28–27 (including Metalurgs) in favor of Liepāja prior to the 2019 Virslīga. Since 2016, the Riga Derby (Rīgas derbijs) was started between Riga FC and

Rīgas FS Rīgas Futbola Skola (Latvian for ''Riga's football school'') is a Latvian women's football club from Riga. The women play in the top level Latvian Women's League and won the championship in 2013 and 2014. They won their third title in 2015. ...

as two clubs were promoted at the same time. A 2019 match in Skonto Stadium between the two sides broke a ten-year attendance record.

Virslīga clubs in international competitions

UEFA competitions UEFA competitions (french: competitions de l'UEFA), referred improperly by the mass media as European football, are the set of tournaments organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA), generally in professional and amateur asso ...

was the Latvian first club who qualified for the group stage of a

club competition, reaching the 2009–10 UEFA Europa League group stage. Europa League group stage Skonto reached the

UEFA Champions League The UEFA Champions League (abbreviated as UCL, or sometimes, UEFA CL) is an annual club football competition organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) and contested by top-division European clubs, deciding the competi ...

last qualifying stage for a number of times in the late 1990s and early 2000s, but lost to such teams like

FC Barcelona Futbol Club Barcelona (), commonly referred to as Barcelona and colloquially known as Barça (), is a professional football club based in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain, that competes in La Liga, the top flight of Spanish football. Found ...

1997 File:1997 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The movie set of ''Titanic'', the highest-grossing movie in history at the time; '' Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone'', is published; Comet Hale-Bopp passes by Earth and becomes one of ...

, Internazionale FC in 1998 and

Chelsea FC Chelsea Football Club is an English professional football club based in Fulham, West London. Founded in 1905, they play their home games at Stamford Bridge. The club competes in the Premier League, the top division of English football. Th ...

in 1999. Most recently, RFS qualified for the 2022-23 UEFA Europa Conference League group stage, finishing in fourth place with 2 points. Commonwealth of Independent States Cup * Skonto **''Runners-up'' (3):

2001 The September 11 attacks against the United States by Al-Qaeda, which killed 2,977 people and instigated the global war on terror, were a defining event of 2001. The United States led a multi-national coalition in an invasion of Afghanist ...

2003 File:2003 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The crew of STS-107 perished when the Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrated during reentry into Earth's atmosphere; SARS became an epidemic in China, and was a precursor to SARS-CoV-2; A ...

2004 2004 was designated as an International Year of Rice by the United Nations, and the International Year to Commemorate the Struggle Against Slavery and its Abolition (by UNESCO). Events January * January 3 – Flash Airlines Flight ...

. *

**''Runners-up'' (1):

2007 File:2007 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: Steve Jobs unveils Apple Inc., Apple's first iPhone (1st generation), iPhone; TAM Airlines Flight 3054 overruns a runway and crashes into a gas station, killing almost 200 people; Former Pakis ...

Baltic League The Baltic League (officially known as the Triobet Baltic League) was a Baltic men's football club tournament held four times between the top club sides from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Launched in 2007 inspired by the now defunct Scandinavi ...

* Metalurgs **Champions (1): 2007. *

**Champions (1): 2010. **''Runners-up'' (2): 2007, 2011. * Skonto **Champions (1): 2011. **''Runners-up'' (1): 2008.

References

External links

Association Virsliga at futbolavirsliga.tv

Virsliga fixtures, including kick off times, at worldfootball.net
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Summer association football leagues it:Campionato lettone di calcio