Victor Pițurcă (Romanian pronunciation:[ˈviktorpiˈt͡surkə]; born 8 May 1956) is a Romanian professional footballmanager and former player.
Club career
Victor Pițurcă was born on 8 May 1956 in Orodel, Dolj County, Romania, starting to play football in 1964 at the youth center of Universitatea Craiova, being loaned in 1974 for one year to Dinamo Slatina in Divizia B, where he started his senior career.[1][2][3][4][5] When he returned to "U" Craiova, coach Constantin Cernăianu gave him Divizia A debut on 19 November 1975 in a 4–0 home win over Argeș Pitești.[1][2] However during his two seasons spent at Craiova, he played rarely, so he went to play again in Divizia B, this time at Pandurii Târgu Jiu under coach Constantin Oțet for whom in his first season from the total of 37 goals scored by the team, Pițurcă scored over half but the team relegated to Divizia C.[2][3][4][5][6][7] In the 1978–79 Divizia C season, Pițurcă scored 46 goals of the team's total of 98, helping it promote back to Divizia B after one year.[5][6][7] In 1979 he went back to Divizia A football, when he went to play for Olt Scornicești, making regular appearances during his four-years spell.[1][2][3][4][5][6][7]
In July 1983 he was wanted by Steaua București where Constantin Cernăianu was coaching, but his coach from Scornicești, Florin Halagian tried to keep him there, eventually at the insistence of Emerich Jenei the transfer to Steaua was fulfilled.[2][3][8] In his first season, he did not win any trophies, but afterwards he helped the team conquer five league titles in a row, starting with The Double from the 1984–85 season when Pițurcă was the second top-goalscorer of the league, having only one goal behind Sportul Studențesc's Gheorghe Hagi, as he scored 19 goals scored in the 32 matches coaches Halagian and Jenei used him, also scoring the decisive goal of the 2–1 victory from the Cupa României final over his former team, Universitatea Craiova.[1][2][4][9][10][11][12][13] In the following season, he was again the league's second top-goalscorer, this time with two goals behind Hagi, having scored 29 in the 34 appearances given to him by Jenei who also used him in all the nine games from the historical European Cup campaign in which Pițurcă was the team's top-goalscorer, netting five times in all the home matches, one against each of Vejle, Budapest Honvéd and Kuusysi Lahti and a brace in the 3–0 win from the semifinals with Anderlecht, then playing as a starter until the 111th minute of extra time when he was replaced with Marin Radu in the eventual 2–0 victory after the penalty shoot-out from the final against Barcelona.[1][2][4][5][9][10][11][12][14] He started the 1986–87 season by playing all the minutes in the 1–0 win over Dynamo Kyiv from the European Super Cup and in the loss from the Intercontinental Cup with the same score in front of River Plate, by the end of it helping Steaua win another Double, coaches Jenei and Anghel Iordănescu giving him 31 league appearances in which he scored 22 goals, being surpassed only by Dinamo București's controversial European Golden Shoe winner, Rodion Cămătaru who scored double, also appearing the full 90 minutes in the 1–0 victory from the Cupa României final over Dinamo.[1][2][4][5][10][11][12][15] In the next season, Pițurcă was used by Iordănescu in 33 league games in which he scored 34 goals, being the top-goalscorer of the championship and European Bronze Boot as only Tanju Çolak (39) and John Eriksen (36) scored more and he made another continental performance with the team as they reached the semi-finals of the European Cup where they lost in favor of Benfica, Pițurcă contributing with one goal scored against Rangers in the 8 matches played.[1][2][4][5][10][11][12][16] In his last season spent with The Military Men, the team won another Double, Iordănescu using him in 22 league matches, managing to score 23 goals, also appearing the whole game in another 1–0 victory in the Cupa României final over rivals Dinamo and made another European performance by playing 7 games in the European Cup campaign, including all the minutes from the 4–0 loss in front of AC Milan from the final, scoring one goal in the semi-finals against Galatasaray when goalkeeper Zoran Simović kicked the ball in the back of his head and it went in the goalpost but the referee wrongfully cancelled the goal.[1][2][4][11][12][17] His last Divizia A game took place on 17 June 1989 in Steaua's 4–1 home win over Flacăra Moreni with him scoring a goal, having a total of 301 appearances with 65 goals in the competition and a total of 29 matches and 6 goals in European competitions.[1][2][4][5]
On 25 March 2008, he was decorated by the president of Romania, Traian Băsescu for the winning of the 1985–86 European Cup with Ordinul "Meritul Sportiv" — (The Order "The Sportive Merit") class II.[19]
International career
Victor Pițurcă played 13 games and scored 6 goals at international level for Romania, making his debut on 27 March 1985 under coach Mircea Lucescu in a friendly which ended 0–0 with Poland.[20][21] After making two appearances at the 1986 World Cup qualifiers, he scored his first two goals for the national team in a 3–1 win over Norway in a friendly game.[20] He scored another brace in a 4–2 friendly victory with Israel and made five appearances at the Euro 1988 qualifiers where he scored two goals in two victories with Albania and Spain, also making his last appearance for Romania on 18 November 1987 in a 0–0 with Austria.[20]
International stats
Appearances and goals by national team and year[20]
In 1996, he was named coach of Romania's under-21 side, leading the team to its first qualification to a European Championship in 1998, which ended up being hosted by Romania.[2][3][4][5][23][25][26][27] The qualification was succeeded after the team won the group 8 of the qualifiers with 8 victories out of 8 matches against Iceland, Republic of Ireland, Lithuania and Macedonia.[25] At the final tournament which was composed of 8 teams, they were eliminated by Netherlands with 2–0 in the quarter-finals, also losing the games for the 5th-8th places and for the 7th place in front of Germany, respectively Russia.[25][26][27] However from the 20-players squad that took part at that tournament, only five did not get to play for Romania's senior team throughout their career.[25]
At the beginning of the year 2000, he returns at Steaua, finishing the championship on the 3rd position, but managed to win the following one and also the 2001 Supercupa României with a 2–1 victory against Dinamo București.[2][4][5][23][32] He resigned in June 2002 after an argument with the club's chairman, Gigi Becali but they reconciled and Pițurcă came back in October the same year.[2] He finished the 2002–03 and 2003–04 seasons on the second place, also guiding the team in the 2003–04 UEFA Cup season when The Red and Blues eliminated in the first two rounds Neman Grodno and Southampton, obtaining a 1–1 in the first leg of the following round with Liverpool, losing the away leg with 1–0, thus the campaign ending.[2][4][33] In July 2004, Pițurcă resigned after another argument with Becali who fired player Romeo Pădureț without his approval.[34]
In 2010, he had two short spells as manager at Steaua and Universitatea Craiova, leaving from both clubs after conflicts with the owners.[2][4][23]
On 14 June 2011, he returned for a third spell in charge of the Romania national team when the chances for qualifying at the Euro 2012 were very low, his objective being to create a team which would qualify for the Euro 2016.[2][39] He was close to qualify at the 2014 World Cup, finishing the qualification group on the second place behind Netherlands but above Turkey, Hungary, Estonia and Andorra, thus reaching the play-off where they lost 4–2 with Greece.[2][28] He started with two victories against Greece and Finland and a draw with Hungary at the Euro 2016 qualifiers, then leaving the team to go in Saudi Arabia, but Romania still managed to qualify at the final tournament by using many of the young players that Pițurcă promoted in the last years.[2][28][40] Victor Pițurcă has a total of 96 games from his three spells at the national team consisting of 53 victories, 23 draws and 20 losses.[2][28]
On 16 October 2014, he signed a two-year deal with Al-Ittihad in Saudi Arabia.[2][4][41] In January 2015, he was heavily criticized for excluding Al-Ittihad's top stars Mohammed Noor and Hamad Al-Montashari due to disobeying training procedure.[42] He was dismissed by the club in June 2015 because the club's officials were unsatisfied that the team finished the season on the fourth place.[4][43] He was replaced by László Bölöni but came back at the club in December the same year only to leave again in July 2016.[2][4][44]
On 22 August 2019, he signed a contract with Universitatea Craiova, resigning in January 2020, being unsatisfied that the club's officials did not want to transfer the players he wanted.[3][4][45][46] Victor Pițurcă has a total of 204 matches as a manager in the Romanian top-division, Liga I, consisting of 116 victories, 43 draws and 45 losses.[45][47]
