Bogdan Stancu
The 'golden generation' of Romanian stars produced the likes of Gheorge Hagi, Ilie Dumitrescu and Dan Petrescu in the 1990s. Since then, seldom few Romanian players have made their mark on world football. One notable exception is Adrian Mutu and in Bogdan Stancu , Steaua Bucharest have a striker with many similarities.
Like Mutu, Stancu was born and raised in the small town of Pitesti, which is renowned for its football pedigree and produced possibly the country's greatest ever player, Nicolae Dobrin. Stancu came through the junior ranks at local club FC Arges Pitesti and made his first-team debut for the club aged 18. After a promising start, he was sent on loan to Dascia Mioveni. On his return to his parent club, Stancu found that he was out of favour with new manager Giuseppe Giannini. Sensing an opportunity, Unirea Urziceni stepped in and snapped up the youngster.
Unirea coach Gigi Netoui clearly saw the potential in Stancu and wasn't disappointed. At Unirea, he built a reputation as an excellent all-round striker. Stancu's strength and technique make him into a more mature striker than his age would suggest. There doesn't appear to be an obvious weak link to Stancu's game. Like Adrian Mutu, he can score with both feet and similar to Mutu again, despite being only 5ft 9in, he is also dangerous in the air. Stancu's ability to do a bit of everything well also makes him very versatile in attack, able to perform several different roles going forward.
Although in playing style there are similarities with compatriot Mutu, in terms of character the two couldn't be more different. While Mutu appears to relish the fame and his drug use has been well documented, Stancu is a humble and quiet character. He had to cope with losing his father as a teenager and some have even described him as an isolated individual. Nonetheless, Stancu's temperament makes him a calm player on the pitch.
Having enjoyed two impressive years at Unirea, Romania's biggest club Steaua Bucharest signed Stancu for 1million euros in May 2008. He could not have got off to a better start, scoring on his debut in a friendly and impressively adding to his tally against AS Roma in another friendly soon after. Having scored four goals in his first five games for Steaua, Stancu ended his debut season as the club's joint leading scorer on 11goals.
Last season saw the striker progress further. He improved his goal record, scoring 14 times in total. Importantly, Stancu also starred in Steaua's Europa League campaign, hitting six goals, including three strikes over two legs against Scottish side Motherwell. One of those goals was a superb long range effort, which have become somewhat of a trademark for Stancu. A successful season was crowned with a call up to the senior national squad by coach Razvan Lucescu for a game against Hungary, although Stancu is still waiting for his first cap.
Steaua finished in a disappointing fourth place in the Romanian league last season and are desperate to reclaim the title during this coming campaign. Given his consistent progress and the ambition of the club, the stage is set for Stancu to really make his mark this term with a stand-out season. The signs are good, with Stancu having scored five goals in six pre-season games. Should he translate his potential into concrete results during the coming year, Stancu could be looking towards a bright future in one of Europe's bigger leagues, completing the same journey that Adrian Mutu also began in the small-town of Pitesti.
