Gheorghe Hagi

Gheorghe Hagi (or Gică Hagi, born February 5, 1965 in Săcele, Constanţa County) was a Romanian football player who played for the Romanian National Team in three World Cups. He was a top attacking midfielder of eighties and nineties in Europe. He was exquisite in passing, ball control and he had great long-range shots. Wherever he played, Hagi left his mark on the game and he was the first Romanian player to truly play at the highest club level possible, since he managed the rare feat of playing for both Spanish giants, Real Madrid and Barcelona. Nicknamed Maradona of the Carpathians or The King, he is a hero in his homeland. He has won his country's Player of the Year award a record six times, and was recently named Romania's player of the century. Now, Gheorghe Hagi is a successful coach and businessman.


Hagi started playing for the local team Farul since an early age. He shone out ever since he was a young boy, despite his small frame and fragile look. He did not have the sheer power of his teammates, but he had an outstanding technique, allowing him to play in championships with kids 3-4 years older. At age 17, Gheorghe Hagi was selected for Farul's senior team, but he would not play there for more then a season, being bought by much wealthier Bucharest-based team Sportul Studenţesc. In the 4 seasons spent at Sportul, Hagi became a name in Romanian soccer. He was top scorer for the club with no less than 58 goals in 107 matches.


This attracted the interest of several European clubs, but with the communist regime still reigning in Romania, he moved to Steaua Bucharest, who just managed the most important achievement in Romanian soccer history, namely winning the European Cup (today's Champions League) in 1986 and thus qualifying for the Super Cup. Actually, Hagi was given an original contract that would last just one match; the final! He played in the Super Cup against UEFA Cup winner Dynamo Kiev and Hagi managed to score the only goal of the match, from a superb free kick. After this feat his contract was prolonged and Hagi played for Steaua another 3 seasons, in which he scored 76 goals in 97 matches, before being picked up by Spanish giant Real Madrid.


Hagi spent 2 seasons at Madrid, but unfortunately didn't manage to win any trophies in Spain with either Real or FC Barcelona. He played 67 matches for Real, scoring 15 goals but he found it hard to adapt to the Spanish soccer and lifestyle, so he decided to move to Brescia in Italy's Serie B (Second Division) where he would be coached by one of his career's mentors, Mircea Lucescu. Winning promotion with Brescia, Hagi was on his way for fame again, but unfortunately Brescia dropped right back in Serie B after one season and Hagi was still in his career's prime and did not want to waste away in a second division, be it the second division of the most powerful championship in the World at that time. His move from Brescia to FC Barcelona saw him return to the Spanish championship but this time with even less success than at Real, since he only played 35 matches for Barca, scoring a total of 7 goals and not winning any trophies.


In 1996, he decided to move closer to home and play for Turkish side Galatasaray Istanbul. Already 31 yo, many rushed to say that Hagi was a finished player, but at Galatasaray he had the best time of his career. The Turkish club team won the UEFA Cup title in 2000. Prior to his retirement in 2001, he won 125 international caps, scoring 35 goals.


Hagi has since returned to football as a coach. He became the head coach of the Romanian National Team in 2001. He then took over as coach of Turkish first division side Bursaspor but left that club after a disappointing start to the season. After a 18 month hiatus spent running a coastal Black Sea hotel and appearing in television commercials, he then returned to club management at the helm of the club at which he won his first European trophy, Galatasaray. In November 2005, Gheorghe Hagi took over as manager at FCU Politehnica Timişoara.

Hagi is ethnically Aromanian. In March 2004, he was named among the FIFA Top 100 living footballers by Pelé.

Mircea Lucescu

Mircea Lucescu (born July 29, 1945, in Bucharest) is a former Romanian football player and one of the most successful Romanian football managers.


Lucescu played 362 matches and scored 78 goals in Romanian First League. He started his football player career at Dinamo Bucharest, one of Romania's top teams, where he played for 15 years; he played also for Politehnica Bucharest and Corvinul Hunedoara. Lucescu appeared 74 times in Romania's National Team. As a player, he won 7 times the Romanian First League and 1 Romania's Cup, with Dinamo Bucharest.


In Romania, Mircea Lucescu managed Dinamo Bucharest, Corvinul Hunedoara, Rapid Bucharest. After coaching Romanian national team, had a long career in Italy, at Pisa, Brescia, Reggiana, Inter Milan. He had a brilliant start with Galatasaray, winning the European Super Cup against Real Madrid. Under Lucescu's managership, Galatasaray qualified to quarter finals in the UEFA Champions League in the 2000-01 season for the first time, but in the quarter finals they lost to Real Madrid. The same year, he lost the Turkish League title to rivals Fenerbahçe. Next year, Gala qualified to second phase in the UEFA Champions League and won Turkish League title under his managership. (2001-2002 season).


Lucescu was disappointed to be sacked despite winning the league champion title. In June 2002, he signed a contract with rival Beşiktaş J.K.. It was a very important season for Beşiktaş since, in 2003, the reputable Turkish club was celebrating her 100th foundation year. In this atmosphere, Beşiktaş made a great work under Lucescu's management. They won the Turkish title by having only one loss, and collecting 85 points; a record for Turkcell Super League as the maximum points collected in a season. So Beşiktaş was able to succeed by winning the championship in 2003, in their first century fest. In the 2002-03 season, Beşiktaş reached the quarter final of the UEFA Cup, only to lose to Lazio. 2003-04 season started very well for Lucescu and Beşiktaş. The team could not qualify from a difficult Champions League group, but was able to get a ticket to UEFA Cup by holding the 3rd position in the group. In the second half of the season, the team's performance declined drastically. Lucescu could not stop the decline. He blamed Turkish Football Federation for one-sided decisions by the referees. After a disastrous second half, Lucescu decided to leave Turkey blaming that his championship was stolen.

He is currently the manager of Shakhtar Donetsk, he won the last 2009 UEFA Cup Final (May 20, 2009) against Werder Bremen 2-1 after extra time. His son, Răzvan Lucescu, is now managing FC Braşov and the Romania national football team.

Helmuth Duckadam

Helmuth Duckadam (born April 1, 1959 in Semlac), former Romanian football goalkeeper, dubbed "the hero of Seville" due to his heroics in the 1986 European Cup Final.

Duckadam started his career playing in the regional league of Arad county, before moving to UT Arad in 1978 to become professional. In 1982 played twice for Romania and, as a result, was signed by country giants FC Steaua Bucharest.


The Romanian goalkeeper leapt into the folklore of both the club and European competition by saving all four penalties taken by FC Barcelona during the shoot-out that won Steaua the European Champion Clubs' Cup on May 7, 1986, at the Estadio Ramón Sánchez Pizjuán in Seville. Duckadam became a hero by saving from José Ramón Alexanko, Angel Pedraza, 'Pichi' Alonso and Marcos Alonso. Only two of the eight penalties were converted as the Romanian side won the shoot-out 2-0 after 120 minutes of football had failed to produce a goal. Steaua won the main European trophy for the first time, and much of the credit for the surprise victory was given to Duckadam.


"I always had a dream about reaching a final and being the decisive player," said Duckadam in an exclusive interview for UEFA's 50 Years of European Club Football commemorative book. "In Seville l had the chance to turn the dream into reality. It was all down to me in the shoot-out. Alexanko took the first penalty. I chose to move to the right and he shot to the right and so I managed to save it. The second one was less simple. I tried to think like Pedraza. He would be thinking that when I’d made one save to the right then I would dive to my left. So he shot to the right and I managed to save the second penalty as well. The third one by Pichi Alonso was simpler. Any goalkeeper who has made two saves to his right is bound to go left for the third one. He shot to the right and I moved right again and saved the third one as well. With the fourth penalty I had a problem. I was seriously wondering what Marcos would do - whether he would copy the other three or shoot to the left. I decided to change side and moved to the left. Marcos also chose that side" - and that was how Helmut Duckadam saved four penalties.


On 25 March 2008, Duckadam was decorated by the president of Romania, with The Sportive Merit" Order class II, for his part in winning the of 1986 European Cup.