European Football Championship 2016 / Romania

This article covers the Romanian national team at the 2016 European Football Championship in France . For Romania it was the fifth European Championship finals participation, with the Romanians meeting the hosts for the first time and playing the opening game against them. The first Romanian participation in the final round also took place in France in 1984.

qualification

Romania completed the qualification for the European Championship in Group F . The Romanians, who were only drawn from the third-best pot in the group draw, began qualifying under Victor Pițurcă , but after only three games he resigned and was replaced by Anghel Iordănescu . They started with a 1-0 win in Greece, which had been drawn as a group head and against which they had failed in the play-offs of qualifying for the 2014 World Cup . The winning goal against the Greeks was scored by Ciprian Marica , who was later sent off with a yellow-red card . After a draw against the Hungarians they had also won their third game, with captain Răzvan Raț playing his 100th international match. Under Iordănescu the next two games were won, but then they came three times only to goalless draws and a 1-1 draw against Finland, in which they equalized only in stoppage time. With a 3-0 win on the last day of the game in the Faroe Islands, they were able to qualify for the finals as second in the group. Group winners were the Northern Irish, who were able to qualify for the finals for the first time. The Hungarians finished third and prevailed against Norway in the play-offs of the third group. During the qualification, the Romanians conceded only two goals and thus the fewest goals against all qualifying participants and were among the only four teams that did not lose a game. But apart from Albania , which played two games less, none of the finalists scored fewer goals.

In total, the coach used 29 players, including the two defenders Vlad Chiricheş and Dragoş Grigore in all ten games. The most qualifying goals for the Romanians were scored by Constantin Budescu , Paul Papp and Bogdan Stancu , who each scored two goals. Andrei Prepeliță and Gabriel Enache made their first international appearance in the first qualifying game . With the 0-0 in Northern Ireland, Florin Andone also made his first international match. On September 4, 2015, Constantin Budescu followed with his first international match and in the last game in which Budescu scored his first two international goals, Denis Alibec was substituted on for his first appearance in the 90th minute.

In the course of the qualification, Romania improved from 28th to 7th in the FIFA world rankings , but then fell back to 14th place.

Games

All results from a Romanian point of view.

date	Venue	opponent	Result	Goal scorers
07.09.2014	Karaiskakis Stadium , Piraeus ( GRC )	Greece	1: 0 (1: 0)	1-0 Ciprian Marica (10th / penalty)
10/11/2014	Arena Națională , Bucharest	Hungary	1: 1 (1: 0)	1-0 Raul Rusescu (45th), 1: 1 Balázs Dzsudzsák (82nd)
14/10/2014	Olympic Stadium , Helsinki ( FIN )	Finland	2: 0 (1: 0)	1: 0, 2: 0 Bogdan Stancu (54th, 83rd)
11/14/2014	Arena Națională , Bucharest	Northern Ireland	2: 0 (0: 0)	1: 0, 2: 0 Paul Papp (74th, 79th)
03/29/2015	Ilie Oană Stadium , Ploieşti	Faroe Islands	1: 0 (1: 0)	1: 0 Claudiu Keşerü (21st)
06/13/2015	Windsor Park , Belfast ( NIR )	Northern Ireland	0-0
04.09.2015	Groupama Aréna , Budapest ( HUN )	Hungary	0-0
07.09.2015	Arena Națională , Bucharest	Greece	0-0
08/10/2015	Arena Națională , Bucharest	Finland	1: 1 (0: 0)	0: 1 Joel Pohjanpalo (67th), 1: 1 Ovidiu Hoban (90th + 1 ′)
10/11/2015	Tórsvøllur , Tórshavn ( FRO )	Faroe Islands	3: 0 (2: 0)	1: 0, 2: 0 Constantin Budescu (4th, 45th + 1 ′), 3: 0 Alexandru Maxim (83th)

table

Pl.	country	Sp.	S.	U	N	Gates	Diff.	Points
1.	Northern Ireland	10	6th	3	1	016: 800	+8	21st
2.	Romania	10	5	5	0	011: 200	+9	20th
3.	Hungary	10	4th	4th	2	011: 900	+2	16
4th	Finland	10	3	3	4th	009:100	−1	12
5.	Faroe Islands	10	2	0	8th	006:170	−11	06th
6th	Greece	10	1	3	6th	007:140	−7	06th

preparation

On March 23, 2016, a game against the Lithuanians who had not qualified for the final round was won 1-0 in Giurgiu , in which three newcomers came to their first appearances with Ioan Hora , Nicolae Stanciu and Alin Toșca . Four days later, the Romanians scored 0-0 against European champions Spain in Cluj-Napoca . In the immediate preparations for the European Championship, test matches took place on May 25 in Saint-Vincent against the Democratic Republic of the Congo (1: 1), on May 29 in Turin against the Ukraine (3: 4) and on June 3 in Bucharest against Georgia (5: 1) instead.

Squad

On May 12, 2016, the preliminary roster with 28 players was named, which was then reduced to 23 players on May 31, 2016.

No.	position	Surname	society	birth date	NM Sp. 2	LS goals 2	debut	EM Sp. 1
01	goalkeeper	Costel Pantilimon	Watford FC	0Feb. 1, 1987	22nd	0	2008
12	goalkeeper	Ciprian Tătărușanu	AC Florence	0Feb 9, 1986	38	0	2010		3
23	goalkeeper	Silviu Lung Jr.	Astra Giurgiu	0June 4th 1989	3	0	2010
02	Defense	Alexandru Mățel	Dinamo Zagreb	Oct 17, 1989	16	0	2011		1				1
03	Defense	Răzvan Raț	Rayo Vallecano	May 26, 1981	112	2	2002	3 (2008)	2				1
04th	Defense	Cosmin Moți	Ludogorez Razgrad	0Dec 3, 1984	8th	0	2008	0 (2008)
06th	Defense	Vlad Chiricheș	SSC Naples	Nov 14, 1989	42	0	2011		3				1
15th	Defense	Valerică Găman	Astra Giurgiu	Feb 25, 1989	14th	1	2011
16	Defense	Steliano Filip	Dinamo Bucharest	May 15, 1994	4th	0	2015		1
21st	Defense	DragoșGrigore	al-Sailiya	0Sep 7 1986	21st	0	2011		3				1
22nd	Defense	Cristian Săpunaru	Pandurii Târgu Jiu	0Apr 5, 1984	14th	0	2008	0 (2008)	3				1
05	midfield	Ovidiu Hoban	Hapoel Beer Sheva	Dec. 27, 1982	21st	1	2013		3
07th	midfield	Alexandru Chipciu	Steaua Bucharest	May 18, 1989	23	3	2011		2				1
08th	midfield	Mihai Pintilii	Steaua Bucharest	0Nov 9, 1984	33	1	2011		2
10	midfield	Nicolae Stanciu	Steaua Bucharest	0May 7, 1993	6th	4th	2016		2
11	midfield	Gabriel Torje	Osmanlıspor FK	Nov 22, 1989	51	11	2010		3				1
17th	midfield	Lucian Sânmărtean	Ittihad FC	13 Mar 1982	20th	0	2002		1
18th	midfield	Andrei Prepeliță	Ludogorez Razgrad	0Dec 8, 1985	10	0	2014		2				1
20th	midfield	Adrian Popa	Steaua Bucharest	July 24, 1988	15th	1	2012		2				1
09	attack	Denis Alibec	Astra Giurgiu	0Jan. 5, 1991	5	1	2015		2
13	attack	Claudiu Keşerü	Ludogorez Razgrad	0Dec. 2, 1986	13	5	2013		1				1
14th	attack	Florin Andone	Cordoba FC	Apr 11, 1993	7th	1	2015		3
19th	attack	Bogdan Stancu	Gençlerbirliği Ankara	June 28, 1987	42	10	2010		3	2

Coach: Anghel Iordănescu

Players who were only in the preliminary roster

position	Surname	society	birth date	International matches 3	Länderspiel- gates 3	debut
Defense	Alin Toșca	Steaua Bucharest	14 Mar 1992	2	0	2016
midfield	Andrei Ivan	CS Universitatea Craiova	0Jan. 4, 1997	3	0	2015
midfield	Alexandru Maxim	VfB Stuttgart	0July 8, 1990	28	3	2012
midfield	Adrian Ropotan	Pandurii Târgu Jiu	0May 8, 1986	7th	0	2008
attack	Ioan Hora	Pandurii Târgu Jiu	Aug 21, 1988	2	0	2016

¹ before the start of the European Championship finals

² As of June 10, 2016, after the first European Championship game in 2016

³ As of May 29, 2016

Finals

Paris Lyon St-Denis Orry-la-Ville

Venues (yellow = draw, red = lost), quarters (blue)

Group stage

In the draw for the six final groups on December 12, 2015, Romania was placed in Pot 3. Romania was drawn into Group A with hosts France and played the opening game against the French. Other group opponents were EM newcomers Albania and Switzerland. Against France, against which the Romanians had already played in the European Championship preliminary round in 1996 and 2008, there were only three wins in 15 games with seven defeats and five draws, two of them in the first two games in 1932 and 1967, the last in 1972 in a friendly game. The last game before the European Championship between the two on September 6, 2011 for the inauguration of the Arena Națională ended goalless. With 1: 2 with a goal in the final minutes, they lost the opening game. Against Albania and Switzerland, the balance was positive and remained positive even after the European Championship games. In the previous 16 games against the Albanians there were eleven wins, three draws and only two defeats (1946 and 1948). The Romanians won the last game between the two on May 31, 2014 in Switzerland with 1-0. Switzerland was defeated five times in 12 games, three games ended in a draw, four were lost - including a 1: 4 in the group game at the 1994 World Cup . After a 1-1 draw against Switzerland, they would have had a chance of making the knockout round with a win against Albania. After the 1-0 defeat against Albania, however, they were the first team to pack their bags because they were the bottom of the group and thus missed the knockout round.

As a result of the European Championship games, Romania lost 22 points in the FIFA world rankings and fell by two places.

Pl.	country	Sp.	S.	U	N	Gates	Diff.	Points
1.	France	3	2	1	0	004: 100	+3	07th
2.	Switzerland	3	1	2	0	002: 100	+1	05
3.	Albania	3	1	0	2	001: 300	−2	03
4th	Romania	3	0	1	2	002: 400	−2	01

Friday 10 June 2016 at 9:00 p.m. in Saint-Denis
France	-	Romania	2: 1 (0: 0)
Wed., June 15, 2016 at 6:00 p.m. in Paris
Romania	-	Switzerland	1: 1 (1: 0)
Sun. 19 June 2016 at 9:00 p.m. in Décines-Charpieu ( Lyon )
Romania	-	Albania	0: 1 (0: 1)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Greece - Romania 0: 1
2. ^ North. Ireland 0-0 Romania
3. ↑ Hungary - Romania 0-0
4. ↑ Faroe Islands - Romania 0: 3
5. ↑ FIFA World Ranking (July 17, 2014)
6. ↑ FIFA World Ranking (August 6, 2015)
7. ↑ FIFA World Ranking (5th November 2015)
8. ↑ "28 de jucători convocați pentru cantonamentul din Italia al echipei naționale" ( Memento of the original from June 5, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , frf.ro 
9. ↑ "Romania invites the deleted five as guests to the EURO" , uefa.com
10. ↑ “UEFA EURO 2016 final draw” , uefa.com