Ionuț Alin Rada (born 6 July 1982) is a Romanian retired

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 played 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 ...

or a

left-back In the sport of association football, a defender is an Glossary of association football terms#O, outfield player whose primary role is to stop attacks during the game and prevent the opposition from scoring. Defenders fall into four main categ ...

. After starting out with hometown club

FC Universitatea Craiova FCU 1948 Craiova Fotbal Club, commonly known as FC U Craiova 1948 or simply FC U Craiova, is a Romanian professional football club based in Craiova, Dolj County, that competes in the Liga II, the second tier of the Romanian league system. FC U ...

, Rada played for

București - Ilfov The București – Ilfov development region () is a development regions of Romania, development region in Romania, encompassing the national capital, Bucharest, as well as the surrounding Ilfov County. As other development regions, it does not hav ...

sides

Rocar Rocar (also T.V. or Autobuzul) was a van, light truck, bus and trolleybus manufacturer based in Bucharest, Romania. The firm also produced light offroad vehicles and later heavy road vehicles. During its existence, the company produced over 350,0 ...

Rapid Rapid(s) or RAPID may refer to: Hydrological features * Rapids, sections of a river with turbulent water flow * Rapid Creek (Iowa River tributary), Iowa, United States * Rapid Creek (South Dakota), United States, namesake of Rapid City Sport ...

, Național, Steaua and

Otopeni Otopeni () is a town in Ilfov County, Muntenia, Romania, neighbouring the north of Bucharest along the DN1 road to Ploiești. It has 21,750 inhabitants, of which 99.0% are ethnic Romanians. One village, Odăile, is administered by the city. H ...

until 2010, when he moved abroad for the first time with a brief stint at

Al-Nasr Al-Nassr Football Club () is a professional football club based in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The club competes in the Saudi Pro League, the top tier of the Saudi football league system. Al-Nassr is one of only three clubs to have participated ...

. He returned to Romania the same year to sign for

CFR Cluj Fotbal Club CFR 1907 Cluj, commonly known as CFR Cluj ( or ) or simply CFR, is a Romanian professional association football, football club based in the city of Cluj-Napoca, Cluj County, that competes in the Liga I. Founded as ''Kolozsvári Vasut ...

, and also represented

Karlsruher SC Karlsruher Sport-Club Mühlburg-Phönix e. V., better known as Karlsruher SC, is a Football in Germany, German association football club, based in Karlsruhe, Baden-Württemberg that currently plays in the 2. Bundesliga, the second tier of Germa ...

Bari Bari ( ; ; ; ) is the capital city of the Metropolitan City of Bari and of the Apulia Regions of Italy, region, on the Adriatic Sea in southern Italy. It is the first most important economic centre of mainland Southern Italy. It is a port and ...

Fidelis Andria Fidelis Andria 2018 or simply Fidelis Andria is an Italian football club based in Andria, Apulia. The club was founded in 1971 and re-founded in 2005, 2013 and 2018. The team competes in . Fidelis Andria play their home matches at Stadio Degl ...

and Sănătatea Cluj before retiring in 2020. Internationally, Rada amassed two

caps Caps are flat headgear. Caps or CAPS may also refer to: Science and technology Computing * CESG Assisted Products Service, provided by the U.K. Government Communications Headquarters * Composite Application Platform Suite, by Java Caps, a Java ...

for the Romania national team between 2003 and 2004.

Club career

FC Universitatea Craiova

Rada started his career playing for

's youth team and also played for Gheorghe Popescu's famous football school from

Craiova Craiova (, also , ) is the largest city in southwestern Romania, List of Romanian cities, the seventh largest city in the country and the capital of Dolj County, situated near the east bank of the river Jiu River, Jiu in central Oltenia. It i ...

. He debuted in

Liga I 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 ...

for Universitatea Craiova playing only four matches being loaned to AS Rocar București. He returned to Universitatea Craiova and played there until 2004, scoring 1 goal in 42 appearances.

Rocar București

He played for AS Rocar București 13 matches but did not manage to score any goals. He was then brought back to Universitatea Craiova

Rapid București

In 2004, he joined

Rapid București Rapid(s) or RAPID may refer to: Hydrological features * Rapids, sections of a river with turbulent water flow * Rapid Creek (Iowa River tributary), Iowa, United States * Rapid Creek (South Dakota), United States, namesake of Rapid City Sport ...

along with his teammate from Universitatea Craiova, Ionut Stancu. From Rapid he was loaned one season to Progresul București, where he gained 14 appearances and scored two goals, one of the two goals was against his current team Steaua București. That goal made

Walter Zenga Walter Zenga (; born 28 April 1960) is an Italian professional football manager and former player, currently club manager at Serie C club Siracusa. He is regarded as one of the greatest goalkeepers of his generation, and one of Italy's best ...

, Steaua București's manager at that time, resign. On 27 July 2006, Rada suffered an injury and missed the start of the season. He spent a month under treatment at the Isokinetic clinic in

Bologna Bologna ( , , ; ; ) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in northern Italy. It is the List of cities in Italy, seventh most populous city in Italy, with about 400,000 inhabitants and 150 different nationalities. Its M ...

. He was left out of the team for the first time on 26 November 2006 by Razvan Lucescu because of his performance against

Mladá Boleslav Mladá Boleslav (; ) is a city in the Central Bohemian Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 47,000 inhabitants. It lies on the left bank of the Jizera (river), Jizera River. Mladá Boleslav is the second most populated city in the region. I ...

in the

UEFA Cup The asterisk ( ), from Late Latin , from Ancient Greek , , "little star", is a Typography, typographical symbol. It is so called because it resembles a conventional image of a star (heraldry), heraldic star. Computer scientists and Mathematici ...

George Copos Gheorghe "George" Copos (; born 27 March 1953, in Tășnad, Satu Mare County) is a Romanian businessman and politician, mostly known for his ownership of the Rapid București football club. Copos was vice-prime-minister between December 2004 and ...

, Rapid's owner, increased Rada's salary from €60,000 to €120,000 on 21 February 2007, due to his good performance. He was one of the lowest paid players from Rapid until his salary was doubled. He played for Rapid in 65 matches and scored three goals. His best performance at this club was the

quarter-finals A single-elimination knockout, or sudden-death tournament is a type of elimination tournament where the loser of a match-up is immediately eliminated from the tournament. Each winner will play another in the next round, until the final match-up, w ...

of the

Steaua București

Rada signed with Steaua București on 25 July 2007 for three years. Steaua București transferred him for a known fee of €800,000 but because the player was 50% owned by former Romanian football player Gheorghe Popescu, the club had to pay him another €800,000 thus resulting a total transfer fee of €1,600,000.

Popescu Popescu ( Francisized as Popesco) is a family name common in Romania (derived from ''popă'', meaning priest). Notable people with the surname include: *Adrian Popescu (born 1960), football (soccer) player * Alexandru Candiano-Popescu (1841–1901) ...

said that he was mainly responsible for Rada's transfer to Steaua București. He was put on the transfer list by his former club Rapid because the fans believed that the player did not give a 100% for the respective club. With his agreement and with the acknowledgment of

he was put on the transfer list. Rada currently earns €120,000 per season, but he said that the money is not important to him because it was his dream to play for Steaua in the

UEFA Champions League The UEFA Champions League (UCL) is an annual club association football competition organised by the UEFA, Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) that is contested by List of top-division football clubs in UEFA countries, top-divisio ...

. He was sure that he made the right choice because he also had offers from other teams. He scored his first goal for Steaua București against

FC Vaslui Fotbal Club Vaslui, commonly known as FC Vaslui, or simply as Vaslui (), was a Romanian professional football club based in Vaslui, Vaslui County, founded in 2002 and dissolved in 2014. Its official club colours were yellow and green, hence t ...

in the current season of

. He scored with a perfect header from a corner kick served by Banel Nicolita. The match ended with the score 1–0 for Steaua București. He made his debut in the

group stage against

Slavia Prague Sportovní klub Slavia Praha – fotbal (Sports Club Slavia Prague – Football, ), commonly known as Slavia Praha or Slavia Prague, is a Czech professional football club in Prague. Founded in 1892, they are the second most successful club in t ...

, match lost by Steaua București with 2–1. He was loaned by his choice to

CS Otopeni Clubul Sportiv Otopeni, commonly known as CS Otopeni, or simply as Otopeni, was a Romanian professional football club from Otopeni, Ilfov County, founded in 2001 and dissolved in 2013. Its greatest performance was that it played for one season ...

. On 28 December 2009 Steaua announced that Rada was sold to

Al-Nasr

On 28 December 2009 he signed on a year and half with Al-Nasr.

CFR Cluj

On 11 June 2010, he signed with Romanian Champions

for three seasons. His first match was against

FC Basel Fussball Club Basel 1893, widely known as FC Basel, FCB, or just Basel, is a Swiss professional Association football, football club based in Basel, in the Basel-Stadt, Canton of Basel-Stadt. Formed in 1893, the club has been List of Swiss footba ...

2010–11 UEFA Champions League The 2010–11 UEFA Champions League was the 56th season of Europe's premier club football tournament organised by UEFA, and the 19th under the UEFA Champions League format. The final was held at Wembley Stadium in London on 28 May 2011, where Ba ...

when he scored his first goal.

Bari

On 19 January 2015, he signed a contract with Serie B outfit

, reuniting with former CFR Cluj sports director Razvan Zamfir.

Fidelis Andria

In August 2016, it was announced Rada signed a 2-years deal with the

Serie C The Serie C (), officially known as Serie C NOW for sponsorship purposes, is the third-highest division in the Italian football league system after the Serie B and Serie A. The Lega Italiana Calcio Professionistico (Lega Pro) is the governing ...

side

International career

He was selected by

Anghel Iordănescu Anghel Iordănescu (; born 4 May 1950), is a Romanian former footballer and former manager, who played as a forward. In 2007, Iordănescu retired from football, and the following February, after his predecessor resigned, he became a member ...

to play for the Romania's national team, making his debut on 20 August 2003 when he came as a substitute and replaced

Răzvan Raț Răzvan Dincă Raț (; born 26 May 1981) is a Romanian former professional footballer who played as a left-back. He made a name for himself in Romania at Rapid București, with whom he won two national titles, one national cup and one supercup ...

in the 88th minute of a friendly which ended with a 2–0 victory against

Ukraine Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the List of European countries by area, second-largest country in Europe after Russia, which Russia–Ukraine border, borders it to the east and northeast. Ukraine also borders Belarus to the nor ...

. On 18 February 2004 he earned his second appearance in a 3–0 victory against

Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the South Caucasus * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the southeastern United States Georgia may also refer to: People and fictional characters * Georgia (name), a list of pe ...

at the

Cyprus International Football Tournament The Cyprus International Football Tournament was an annual winter association football friendly competition for national teams that takes place in Cyprus. It was traditionally held in February as a friendly tournament since at least 1997, and last ...

Honours

Rapid București *

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 ...

: 2005–06, 2006–07 *

Supercupa României The Supercupa României () is a Romanian football (soccer), football championship contested by the winners of the Liga I and the Cupa României. It is usually played at the Arena Națională in Bucharest. The competition started off in 1994 Supe ...

2006 2006 was designated as the International Year of Deserts and Desertification. Events January * January 1– 4 – Russia temporarily cuts shipment of natural gas to Ukraine during a price dispute. * January 12 – A stampede during t ...

CFR Cluj *

: 2011–12 *

runner-up:

2012–13 1 (one, unit, unity) is a number, numeral, and glyph. It is the first and smallest positive integer of the infinite sequence of natural numbers. This fundamental property has led to its unique uses in other fields, ranging from science to sp ...

runner-up:

2012 2012 was designated as: *International Year of Cooperatives *International Year of Sustainable Energy for All Events January *January 4 – The Cicada 3301 internet hunt begins. * January 12 – Peaceful protests begin in the R ...

References

External links

Official website
* * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Rada, Ionut 1982 births Footballers from Craiova Living people Romanian men's footballers Romania men's international footballers Romania men's under-21 international footballers Men's association football defenders FC U Craiova 1948 players AFC Rocar București players FC Progresul București players FC Rapid București players FCSB players CS Otopeni players Al-Nasr SC (Dubai) players CFR Cluj players Karlsruher SC players SSC Bari players Fidelis Andria 2018 players Liga I players UAE Pro League players 2. Bundesliga players Serie B players Serie C players Romanian expatriate men's footballers Expatriate men's footballers in the United Arab Emirates Expatriate men's footballers in Germany Expatriate men's footballers in Italy 21st-century Romanian sportsmen