Victor Piturca

Victor Piţurcă (born 8th Of May 1956 in Orodel, Dolj County, Romania) is a former football striker. He was one of the prolific strikers of Steaua Bucharest, being one of the team's top scorers – he scored a massive 165 goals in 175 games played for this team.

Piţurcă joined Universitatea Craiova as a youth in 1970, aged 14, and four years later he was loaned to Dinamo Slatina, a club from Romania's second football league, in order to gain more experience. Before being called back to Craiova in 1975, making his debut for the team in November that year. As he was not used too much by Universitatea, Piţurcă left the club in 1977 to join Pandurii Târgu Jiu and then FC Drobeta Turnu-Severin, from where he was signed by FC Olt, thus returning to play in Liga I.

In 1983 he was requested by Steaua, helping the club to reach its highest peak in European football. Piţurcă's team won the UEFA Champions League in 1986 and the European Supercup in 1987. Piţurcă won the Romanian Championship with Steaua Bucharest 5 times and the Romanian Cup 4 times. At the end of the 1987-88 season he was the top scorer of Liga I and won UEFA's Bronze Boot. For Romanian National football team, Piţurcă only get 13 caps, scoring 6 goals.

After playing for Racing Club de Lens during the 1989-90 season, Piţurcă retired from professional football to take over as coach. His first appointment was for Steaua Bucharest in 1991, followed by another one with Universitatea Craiova in 1994, finishing second in the table at the end of 1994-95 season.

In 1996 he was named coach of the Romania Under 21 side, leading the team to its best performances ever, including a qualification to the Under 21 European Championship in 1998, hosted by Romania. In 1998 he was appointed as Romania's manager and qualified the team to the 2000 European Football Championship. However, despite finishing the qualification group undefetead, Piţurcă was sacked before even taking his squad to the Euro 2000.

In December 1999 he took over as manager of Steaua Bucharest, winning the championship in 2001, but resigned in 2004. In December 2004 he was appointed manager of Romania for the second time. At first Romania did well under his coaching, defeating several important European teams both in friendlies (Germany, Spain) and official matches (Czech Republic in Group 1 of the 2006 FIFA World Cup Qualification and the Netherlands in Group G of the UEFA 2008 Qualifying Round).

After topping their qualifying group (and thus qualifying for their first international tournament in 8 years), Romania was drawn in Group C at UEFA Euro 2008, alongside the Netherlands, Italy and France. At the time of the draw, these countries' respective Elo rankings among European teams were 1st, 2nd, 4th and 8th. After drawing their first two games against the finalists of the previous World Cup (0-0 against France, 1-1 against Italy), Romania lost 0-2 to the Netherlands, finishing the group in third place and thus being eliminated from the competition.

In 2009, the Romanian Football Federation released Victor Piţurcă from his job from the Romania national football team on April 9th, 2009. A few weeks later, Răzvan Lucescu was appointed as his successor.

In July 2010 Victor Piţurcă accepted to be Steaua Bucharest's manager. He prepared this team for the first 2 games in the season. Both were victories. After them he resigned his contract and starting with the 6th game of the season he accepted a 3 years contract as manager of Universitatea Craiova. After 15 years we may hope again. Long live Victor Piţurcă!

Universitatea Craiova - Sportul Studentesc 1-0

Universitatea Craiova won with 1-0 Saturday evening, on "Ion Oblemenco" stadium, a match against Sportul Studentesc Bucharest. This was the first game of Victor Piturca as trainer of our team after 15 yars. He used to train Craiova in 1994-1995 when our team finished the championship on the 2nd place in the table.

The only goal of the game was succeeded by Ovidiu Stoianof in the last minute (90+1). Both players who contributed for this goal were inserted in the second half. Dragos Firtulescu did the pass and Stoianof scored after a ball rejected by the Sportul Studentesc's goalkeeper.

To match roughly 25,000 spectators attended the University managed first victory in this championship.

This was the 59th student "duel" between Universitatea Craiova and Sportul Studentesc. Craiova won 23 games on their own field, and Sportul won only 4. In general, Universitatea gathered 30 victories and Sportul 18, other 11 matches ended with a draw.

Our team: 21.Lung - 18.Dananae, 7.Gaman, 4.Iliev, 6.Ciuca - 13.Dilevski, 77.Wobay (25.Firtulescu '70), 30.Prepelita, 20.Dina (23.Gargorov '59) - 9.M. Costea - 27.Al. Piturca (19.Stoianof

'76). Coach: Victor Piturca.

The King Is Dead, Long Live The King!

Universitatea Craiova resigned Aurica Ticleanu's contract. The new Trainer of the team will be Victor Piturca. The former trainer of Romanian national football team, and of Steaua Bucharest signed for 3 years with Universitatea Craiova.

3 days of negotiation were necessary for Universitatea Craiova to make Victor Piturca sign this contract. It was the longest and the toughest process of getting a new trainer in this club's history.

After documets were made, a big fan's reaction spread all over Oltenia. It was an unprecedented wave of love among every single people in this region. The fans made for him welcome banners and for the first training session it was an audience of 2500 people who sang and encouraged Universitatea Craiova and its new trainer, Victor Piturca.

For the next game, Saturday 19:00 o'clock, local time, there are 30,000 viewers expected to be in the stadium. Until now, there are already 5,000 sold tickets and 2 more days until the match against Sportul Studentesc.

Astra Ploiesti - Universitatea Craiova 2-2

Michael Stoichiţă and Aurel Ticeanu were looking for their first victory in stage fifth, when Craiova visited Astra Ploiesti. Two teams with a single purpose: the three points of victory. In spite of the desire and effort the game ended 2-2, and the fans of those two teams have to wait at least one week to see their dream come true.

With shy attacks and without horizon Astra and Craiova could not score until the first error of the opposite defense. That happened in the 30th minute of the game, when Nogo lost a ball in front of Piturca jr., and the striker did a simple formality scoring for 0-1. Ţicleanu and his band seemed to have taken control, but Silviu Lung jr. failed to catch Popara's free kick from 30 meters, and the score became 1-1 in the 37th minute of the game.

After the break, Astra attacked and get a penalty kick after a fault of Gaman against Fatai. Rohat scored for 2-1 in the 65th minute of the game. Ten minutes after, Madalin Ciuca scored with a head kick from 3 meters after a corner kick of Gangioveanu. Madalin Ciuca used to be Universitatea Craiova's captain until 2008. He was sold to Bistrita then but he came back this summer. Maybe this is a sign for a good future. Both teams tried to score in the last minutes of the game, but the scored did not change until the end of the match. 2-2 and the first point won away by Universitatea Craiova. 

Universitatea Craiova - FC Timisoara 1-1

The championship has started only now for Universitatea Craiova. Ion Oblemenco stadium became again the meeting point of the Oltenians' emotions, pride and passion. Ilie Balaci, one of the most important football players of Craiova in the past, was assisting this game.

Ţicleanu kept his word after the humiliation from Buzau and proposed a surprising team for this game. Lopes and the young Roman were in the first eleven for the first time. The game has changed but not much. Craiova made e defending game, taking care especially for the movements of the opponent. Timisoara had not an elaborate construction, so they had some casual shots to the goal. Piturca ('21) and Prepelita ('44) made some good opportunities for Craiova and Alexa ('23) for Timisoara, but just for artistic impression.

Timisoara was about to go to cabins in advantage after a double occasion. First, Iliev was close to own goal, after rejecting a ball, then Scutaru had an exceptionally head shot but Lung was ready to defend the goal.

Seven minutes after the break, a normal clear phase made Cisovski and Luchin have given head in the head instead to reject the ball. Piturca took this opportunity and he scored from six meters. In the last minute of the extra time, Zicu scored for Timisoara and the game went for a draw result.

Our team: 21.Lung - 18.Dananae, 7.Gaman, 4.Iliev, 6.Ciuca - 13.Dilevski, 30.Prepelita, 92.Roman ('60 2.Barboianu), 3.Lopez - 27.Piturca ('76 19.Stoianof), 9.M.Costea ('89 25.Firtulescu)

Back to Ion Oblemenco Stadium

Universitatea Craiova used to play the games considered at home, in Severin. There are 120 Km between Craiova and Drobeta Turnu-Severin, next big city to west. Oltenia region consists in 5 disctricts: Dolj, Olt, Gorj, Mehedinti and Valcea. Capital of Dolj county is Craiova. Capital of Mehedinti county is Drobeta Turnu-Severin. 

The next match, against FC Timisoara, will be played on the old Central stadium from Craiova. This stadium was built in 1968 and get the name of the most important football player of Universitatea Craiova, Ion Oblemenco, on 1st September 1996, when this great man died.

This is first game played in Craiova by Universitatea since December 2009. The City Hall of Craiova decided this team should leave Ion Oblemenco stadium and our favorite players used the arena from Severin instead. Now it is the time from Craiova to come back home. Welcome back Stiinta!

Victoria Branesti - Universitatea Craiova 1-0

Universitatea Craiova did not had trouble with referees as in the first two rounds, but ceded in Buzau, reaching three games without victory.

In the past, white-blues were qualified in the Champions League after the first two stages, but even Stiinta is not anymore that it used to be. There were to confused teams who played a bad football. Mihai Costea had a half-chance in the 10th minute of the game. Lung jr. trained twice for Dorinel Popa's shots. In the second half, the game was looking the same. Craiova had a chance by Firţulescu but his shot was denied from goal's line. Simion, ex-Steaua player, had a head shot after a corner and hit precisely for 1-0.

Our team: 21.Lung - 18.Dănănae, 7.V. Găman, 4.Iliev, 6.Ciucă – 30.Prepeliţă, 13. Dilevski ('77 19.Stoianof), 2.Bărboianu, 28.Gângioveanu ('62 25.Firtulescu) - 9.M. Costea, 20.Dina ('46 27.Piturca)

Steaua Bucharest - Universitatea Craiova 2-1

Universitatea Craiova played another game against a team from Bucharest. Always it happens like this. This scenario comes again and over again in front of our eyes. Craiova plays really good football and the other team is just waiting for the referee to change the result of the game. This is not a mistake. This happens at every game our team is playing.

It was 0-0 until the break. The game was really nice until then. In the 51st minute of the game, Mihai Costea stroke a corner kick. This was a good assist for Valentin Iliev who scored with a strong head kick. In the 57th minute, Mihai Costea got the ball again. He made a good pass near Abrudan and scored for 2-0. With no reason, the referee canceled Craiova's goal. Everybody on the field got stoned. Why?

After all these Steaua scored twice and the game finished with the wanted result by the referee of the game. What can we do now? There were 2 games in this new season. In the first game the referee of the game did not want to give a penalty kick for Universitatea Craiova. In the second game, another referee canceled a perfect goal of the same team. Craiova has only 1 point in the table instead of 6 which normally could have.

Our team: 1.Lung - 18.Dănănae, 7.Găman, 4.Iliev, 6.Ciucă, 2.Bărboianu, 13.Dilevski ('81 27.Piturca), 30.Prepeliţă, 23.Gargorov ('78 77.Wobay), 9.Mihai Costea, 20.Dina ('70 19.Stoianof)