Belasitsa

Twice a season the roads out of Petrich fill up for a derby that has nothing to do with the league table. Against Vihren Sandanski it is the "Macedonian Derby", a name that owes more to geography and memory than to fixtures, and against Pirin Blagoevgrad it is the "Southwestern Derby" — regardless of where either side sits.

The name Komitite, "The Committees", points the same way: it recalls the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization and Yane Sandanski, who came from Petrich.

Its record at the top level is modest and its crises have been real. Relegation in 2009 was followed by disqualification from the Second League over registration problems, dropping the club to the fourth tier before municipal backing rebuilt it; a second collapse in 2012–2013 sent it down again before it recovered. Between those episodes lies a sixth-place finish in 2005–06, still the club's best league placing, and a Bulgarian Cup semi-final from 1981.

The 1980s are remembered differently, as the period when Petrich stopped importing talent and started producing it. Dimitar Karadaliev came through that generation and still holds the club's appearance record in the top flight, 108 games, to go with 19 goals, while Lozan Trenchev played 105.

Belasitsa marked its centenary in 2023 — a hundred years on from a club that first took the field as Manush Voivoda.