Raków Częstochowa Raków Częstochowa traces its roots back to 1921, when workers of a local ammunition factory founded Klub Sportowo-Footbolowy Racovia, the name changed to Raków Częstochowa in 1928 after the Raków district was incorporated into the city. For most of the twentieth century Raków remained a modest provincial side, though its academy produced Jakub Błaszczykowski, later captain of the Polish national team.
The club's transformation began in 2014, when it was taken over by Michał Świerczewski, founder of the computer-retail chain x-kom. Unlike traditional football executives, Świerczewski applied a corporate, data-driven management style to the club, built around long-term planning and close trust in the sporting department. In 2016 he appointed Marek Papszun as head coach; within two seasons Papszun had won the second-tier title and returned Raków to the Ekstraklasa in 2019, ending a 21-year absence from Poland's top flight.
What followed was one of the fastest rises in modern Polish football. Raków won the Polish Cup in 2020/21, beating Arka Gdynia in the final, and lifted the Polish Super Cup for the first time a few months later. The following season brought a second consecutive Cup, this time against Lech Poznań, and a second straight Super Cup, again at Lech's expense. The culmination came in 2022/23, when Raków – playing a disciplined, highly organised style built under Papszun – won the Polish championship for the first time in the club's history, finishing above traditional powers such as Legia Warszawa and Lech Poznań. Along the way, the club also gained regular experience in European qualifying rounds, reaching the group stage of the UEFA Europa Conference League.
Papszun left the club after the title-winning season, and Raków endured a difficult 2023/24 campaign under his former assistant before persuading him to return in 2024; under Papszun once again, the team finished as league runners-up in 2024/25, missing out on the title to Lech Poznań by a single point. Whatever the results of any given season, Raków – still playing its home matches at the modest municipal stadium on Limanowskiego Street in Częstochowa – is now widely cited in Polish football as a model of organisational discipline, proof that a technocratic, business-minded approach can reshape a club with no historical pedigree into a genuine contender.
