# Florian Dumitrescu

Florian Dumitrescu (born 27 October 1946) is a Romanian former footballer who played as a forward. In the 1970–71 European Cup, Dumitrescu scored UTA's decisive goal that eliminated Feyenoord who were European champions at that time.

## Club career

Florian Dumitrescu was born on 27 October 1946 in Bucharest, Romania, starting to play junior level football in 1961 at Avântul 9 Mai. From 1964 until 1966 he played at Minerul Anina in Divizia C where he was noticed by UTA Arad's coach Nicolae Dumitrescu who brought him to the club, giving him his Divizia A debut on 12 March 1967 in a 2–1 home loss in front of Rapid București. Under the guidance of Nicolae Dumitrescu he helped The Old Lady win two consecutive titles, at the first contributing with two goals scored in 15 appearances and in the second he played 29 games, scoring four times. In the 1970–71 European Cup, Dumitrescu scored UTA's decisive goal that eliminated Feyenoord who were European champions at that time after he received an assist from Mircea Axente and defeated goalkeeper Eddy Treijtel with a header while being in between opponents Rinus Israel and Theo van Duivenbode. In the following round they got eliminated by Red Star Belgrade and after the first leg, the opponents coach was asked by journalist Ioan Chirilă which player from UTA would he bring to his team, Miljan Miljanić naming Florian Dumitrescu.
In 1971 he went to play at Dinamo București for three seasons, the highlights of this period being eight goals scored in the 1971–72 season and winning the title in the following season, contributing with five goals in the 26 appearances given to him by coach Ion Nunweiller. Dumitrescu also represented The Red Dogs in European competitions, most notably in the 1971–72 European Cup, helping the team pass Spartak Trnava in the first round but being eliminated in the following one by his old acquaintance, Feyenoord.
In 1974 he went for one season at Dinamo's rival Steaua București. Afterwards he went at Divizia B club, Petrolul Ploiești which he helped promote to the first league in his second season but the team relegated back to the second division after just one year. After playing one year more year with Petrolul in Divizia B, Dumitrescu came back to Divizia A football in 1979 when he signed with Olt Scornicești, scoring a goal in the 6–0 win over Olimpia Satu Mare from the first round of the season. Dumitrescu played his last Divizia A match in the following season on 2 November 1980 helping Scornicești earn a 4–2 home victory against FCM Galați, having a total of 238 games with 31 goals scored in the competition, also making 12 appearances with one goal scored in the European Cup.

## International career

He was taken in consideration by coach Angelo Niculescu to be part of Romania's 1970 World Cup squad, but because he got injured, Dumitrescu missed the tournament. Eventually, Niculescu gave him his debut on 11 October 1970 in a 3–0 home victory against Finland at the Euro 1972 qualifiers where he also played in a 0–0 with Wales. Florian Dumitrescu made a total of four appearances for the national team, his last one taking place on 20 September 1972, a 1–1 with Finland at the 1974 World Cup qualifiers. He also played once for Romania's Olympic team in a 2–1 victory against Albania at the 1972 Summer Olympics qualifiers.

## Honours

UTA Arad
* Divizia A: 1968–69, 1969–70
Dinamo București
* Divizia A: 1972–73
Petrolul Ploiești
* Divizia B: 1976–77