Florea Birtașu (1 February 1930 – 9 February 2018) was a

Romania Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern and Southeast Europe. It borders Ukraine to the north and east, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Bulgaria to the south, Moldova to ...

n football

goalkeeper In many team sports that involve scoring goal (sport), goals, the goalkeeper (sometimes termed goaltender, netminder, GK, goalie, or keeper) is a designated player charged with directly preventing the opposing team from scoring by blocking or i ...

Club career

Birtașu was born on 1 February 1930 and started to play football in 1950 at Flacăra Roșie București. In 1951, he joined Flacăra București where under the guidance of coach Gheorghe Bărbulescu he made his

Divizia A Liga I (; ''First League''), also spelled as Liga 1 and officially known as SuperLiga for sponsorship reasons, is a professional association football league in Romania and the highest level of the Romanian football league system. Contested by 1 ...

debut on 16 June 1951 in a 0–0 draw against

CCA București CCA may refer to: Arts and culture * Canadian Centre for Architecture, museum and research centre in Montreal, Quebec * Canadian Comedy Awards, annual awards show * CCA, a London-based talent agency founded by Howard Pays and Freddy Vale * Capitol ...

. Afterwards he went to play at

CA Câmpulung Moldovenesc CA Câmpulung Moldovenesc was a football club based in Câmpulung Moldovenesc, Suceava County, Romania. It was founded in 1948 and dissolved in 1953. History The club was founded in the summer of 1948 with initial headquarters at Iaşi under th ...

for two years. In 1954 he signed with

Dinamo București A dynamo is a magnetic device originally used as an electric generator. Dynamo or Dinamo may also refer to: Places * Dinamo (Moscow Metro), a station of the Moscow Metro, Moscow, Russia * Dinamo (Yekaterinburg Metro), a station of the Yekaterin ...

, where his first performance was reaching the

1954 Cupa României final Events January * January 3 – The Italian broadcaster RAI officially begins transmitting. * January 7 – Georgetown–IBM experiment: The first public demonstration of a machine translation system is held in New York, at the head ...

, but coach

Angelo Niculescu Angelo Niculescu (1 October 1921 – 20 June 2015) was a Romanian football player and manager. He is best remembered in Romania for being the national team's coach at the 1970 World Cup and for inventing the "temporizare" ("delaying") tactics ...

did not use him in the eventual 2–0 loss to Metalul Reșița. In the following season, Birtașu helped the club win the first Divizia A title in its history, being used by Niculescu in 18 games. He played in the first European match of a Romanian team in the

1956–57 European Cup The 1956–57 European Cup was the second season of the European Cup, Europe's premier club football tournament. The competition was won for the second time by Real Madrid, who beat Fiorentina 2–0 in the final at the Santiago Bernabéu, Madrid ...

in the 3–1 victory against

Galatasaray Galatasaray Spor Kulübü (, ''Galatasaray Sports Club''), more commonly referred to as simply Galatasaray and familiarly as Cimbom, is a Turkish sports club based on the European side of the city of Istanbul including basketball, wheelchair ...

, helping '' The Red Dogs'' go to the next phase of the competition where they were eliminated by CDNA Sofia, Birtașu making two appearances in the campaign. In 1957 he went to play for Progresul București, winning with them the

1959–60 Cupa României The 1959–60 Cupa României was the 22nd edition of Romania's most prestigious Association football, football Single-elimination tournament, cup competition. The title was won by FC Progresul București, Progresul București against Victoria Buc ...

, but coach

Augustin Botescu Augustin Botescu was a Romanian football manager who coached Romania at the 1960 European Nations' Cup qualifiers and Romania's Olympic team at the 1960 Summer Olympics qualifiers, failing to qualify for both tournaments. He has a total of 7 g ...

did not use him in the 2–0 win in the

final Final, Finals or The Final may refer to: *Final examination or finals, a test given at the end of a course of study or training *Final (competition), the last or championship round of a sporting competition, match, game, or other contest which d ...

against Dinamo Obor București. In 1960, after totaling 96 Divizia A appearances, Birtașu went to play for CFR Roșiori in

Divizia B 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 football season. It is currently sponsored by Casa Pariu ...

for a few years.

International career

Birtașu played three games at international level for

, making his debut under coach

Ștefan Dobay Ștefan Dobay (, 26 September 1909 – 7 April 1994), was a Romanian footballer who played as a striker and manager. He mostly played for Ripensia Timișoara and the Romania national football team for whom he got 41 caps, scored 19 goals an ...

in a 1–0 loss to

Czechoslovakia Czechoslovakia ( ; Czech language, Czech and , ''Česko-Slovensko'') was a landlocked country in Central Europe, created in 1918, when it declared its independence from Austria-Hungary. In 1938, after the Munich Agreement, the Sudetenland beca ...

in the 1954 World Cup qualifiers. His following two games were friendlies, a 1–0 victory against

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the archipelago of Svalbard also form part of the Kingdom of ...

and a 4–1 loss to

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. It borders Norway to the west and north, and Finland to the east. At , Sweden is the largest Nordic count ...

Death

Birtașu died on 9 February 2018 at age 88.

Honours

Dinamo București *

1955 Events January * January 3 – José Ramón Guizado becomes president of Panama. * January 17 – , the first nuclear-powered submarine, puts to sea for the first time, from Groton, Connecticut. * January 18– 20 – Battle of Yijian ...

Cupa României The Cupa României () is a Association football, football cup competition for List of football clubs in Romania, Romanian teams which has been held annually since 1933–34 Cupa României, 1933–34, except during World War II. It is the Romania ...

runner-up:

1954 Events January * January 3 – The Italian broadcaster RAI officially begins transmitting. * January 7 – Georgetown–IBM experiment: The first public demonstration of a machine translation system is held in New York, at the head ...

Progresul București *

: 1959–60

Notes

References

External links

Florea Birtașu
at Labtof.ro {{DEFAULTSORT:Birtașu, Florea 1930 births 2018 deaths Romanian men's footballers Romania men's international footballers Men's association football goalkeepers Liga I players Liga II players FC Petrolul Ploiești players FC Dinamo București players FC Progresul București players Place of birth missing 20th-century Romanian sportsmen