Artur Crăciun (born 29 June 1998) is a Moldovan professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby lea ...

who plays as a

centre-back In the sport of association football, a defender is an outfield player whose primary role is to stop attacks during the game and prevent the opposition from scoring. Defenders fall into four main categories: centre-backs, full-backs, sweepers ...

for Polish I liga club

ŁKS Łódź ŁKS Łódź (''Łódzki Klub Sportowy Łódź''; ) is a Polish sports club based in Łódź. They are best known for their football club but are represented in many sports such as basketball, volleyball, boxing, and in the past ice hockey, ...

and the Moldova national team.

Club career

Crăciun made his professional debut for Zimbru in the Divizia Națională on 20 May 2016 against Academia Chișinău, coming on as a 92nd-minute substitute. On 23 July 2019 he signed a contract with Romanian

Liga II The Liga 2, most commonly spelled as Liga II, is the second level of the Romanian football league system. The league changed its name from Divizia B just before the start of the 2006–07 Liga II, 2006–07 football season. It is currently Sponso ...

side Universitatea Cluj. On 10 March 2021, he was loaned out to Sfântul Gheorghe from Budapest Honvéd. In June 2022, he moved to Hapoel Kfar Saba. On 10 July 2023, Crăciun signed a one-year contract, with an option to extend, with Polish

Ekstraklasa (; meaning "Extra Class" in Polish), officially known as PKO Bank Polski Ekstraklasa due to its Sponsor (commercial), sponsorship by PKO Bank Polski, is a professional association football league in Poland and the highest level of the Polish foo ...

newcomers

Puszcza Niepołomice MKS Puszcza Niepołomice () is a professional association football, football club located in Niepołomice, Poland. The team competes in the I liga, the second level of the Polish football league system. The team's colors are yellow, white and gr ...

. On 23 July, he made his debut in Puszcza's first-ever top-tier outing, a 3–2 away loss to

Widzew Łódź RTS Widzew Łódź () is a Polish football (soccer), football club based in Łódź. The club was founded in 1910. Its official colours are red and white, hence their nicknames ''Czerwona Armia'' (Red Army) and ''Czerwono-biało-czerwoni'' (Red-wh ...

. He regularly appeared in the line-ups thereafter, contributing to Puszcza's bid for top-flight survival by scoring game-winning goals in home games against Widzew on 11 December, and

Lech Poznań Kolejowy Klub Sportowy Lech Poznań S.A., commonly referred to as KKS Lech Poznań or simply Lech Poznań (), is a Polish professional football club based in Poznań and currently competing in the Ekstraklasa, the nation's highest division. ...

on 13 April 2024; he also became the designated penalty taker. On 10 May, Puszcza exercised their option to prolong Crăciun's contract for another twelve months.

International career

He made his debut for Moldova national team on 14 November 2019 in a Euro 2020 qualifier against

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

. He started the game and played the whole match.

Career statistics

International

Honours

Milsami Orhei *

Moldovan Cup Cupa Moldovei (), officially known as Cupa Orange Group, Orange for sponsorship reasons, is a association football, football competition, held annually in Moldova. The winner qualifies for the UEFA Europa League first qualifying round. Finals Th ...

: 2017–18 *

Moldovan Super Cup The Moldovan Super Cup () is the national football (soccer), football super cup competition in Moldova, officially having the winners of the previous season's Moldovan Liga and Moldovan Cup face-off against each other. In case when the national cu ...

2019 This was the year in which the first known human case of COVID-19 was documented, preceding COVID-19 pandemic, the pandemic which was declared by the World Health Organization the following year. Up to that point, 2019 had been described as ...

Sfîntul Gheorghe * Moldovan Cup: 2020–21

Notes

References

External links

* * *https://www.farulconstanta.com/echipa/fc-viitorul/jucatori/kevin-luckassen *https://www.uefa.com/uefanationsleague/teams/players/250105892--artur-craciun/?_preview_token_uefacom=covid_guidance_token%2Ccovid_guidance_token%2Ccovid_guidance_token *https://www.whoscored.com/Players/387953/Fixtures/Artur-Craciun 1998 births Living people Footballers from Chișinău Moldovan men's footballers 21st-century Moldovan sportsmen Moldova men's youth international footballers Moldova men's under-21 international footballers Moldova men's international footballers Men's association football defenders Moldovan Super Liga players FC Zimbru Chișinău players FC Sheriff Tiraspol players FC Milsami Orhei players FC Universitatea Cluj players Budapest Honvéd FC players FC Viitorul Constanța players FC Sfîntul Gheorghe players PFC Lokomotiv Plovdiv players FC Tsarsko Selo Sofia players Hapoel Kfar Saba F.C. players Puszcza Niepołomice players Liga II players Nemzeti Bajnokság I players First Professional Football League (Bulgaria) players Liga Leumit players Ekstraklasa players Moldovan expatriate men's footballers Expatriate men's footballers in Romania Expatriate men's footballers in Hungary Expatriate men's footballers in Bulgaria Expatriate men's footballers in Israel Expatriate men's footballers in Poland Moldovan expatriate sportspeople in Romania Moldovan expatriate sportspeople in Hungary Moldovan expatriate sportspeople in Bulgaria Moldovan expatriate sportspeople in Israel Moldovan expatriate sportspeople in Poland {{Moldova-footy-bio-stub