I was wrong.
Back in January I said Unirea Urziceni would not be allowed to win the Romanian league title this year. I was fortunately very wrong. Urziceni, an awful town of 17,000 people, 66,227 stray dogs and no supermarket a short drive north east of Bucharest, can now boast to be the home of the Romanian champions. Coach Dan Petrescu (yes, the very same Chelsea legend) is clearly a genius in the making. To defeat the big Bucharest clubs over a season is no mean feat: in this country football is not always 11 versus 11, remember, especially when Dinamo Bucharest (who finished second after self-destructing in the final weeks) and Romanian referees are involved.
Luckily, Urziceni’s request to have key matches at the end of the season refereed by foreign officials was granted by the Romanian FA. As such, there were no funny goings on, and, for once, the best team in the league won.
It’s been suggested already that if his former club any vision they might have appointed him instead of Carlo Ancelotti. It’s a little early for that. He will need to win titles in countries with a standard of football far better than Romania before he can be taken too seriously.
Still, the prospect of Champions League football in the capital again is a real one: Urziceni’s stadium is not up to Champions League standards, so Urziceni will probably play at Steaua’s Ghencea stadium.
Chelsea in Bucharest? Petrescu up against his old club? It could happen. In fact, it almost certainly will.
Football has a habit of coming up with these things.
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
It was Henry, not Trezeguet, sorry for that!
You know, a few years ago, more than 10 years that is, Carlo Ancelotti was in charge of Juventus. And they played in the Intertoto Cup against Rostelmash Rostov na Donu and after that against Ceahlaul Piatra Neamt (of Viorel Hizo and Gheorghe Stefan Pin'alti). And it was 1-1 in Piatra Neamt with an equalizer by Tacchinardi and 0-0 in Italy with Trezeguet and Axinia both striking against the post. And after that Juventus were drawn against Olympiakos and Carlo Ancelotti said "after Rostov na Donu and Piatra Neamt, now Athens looks like New York!".
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I'm saying this because it appears that Urziceni will play their home games in CL in Piatra Neamt
Dan Petrescu is a Chelsea legend. Me Chelsea fan. End of story. In fact, Petrescu is very well liked: this guy likes Dan the Man for he is also apparently a Sheffield Wednesday legend: http://szekely.blogspot.com/2009/06/dan-man.html
You mean UEFA has a habit of coming up with these things.
I would love to see once more in this lifetime a Champions League season like 2001-2002 (with 2 group stages and 6-8 teams of equal value) and a World Cup like 1994 (with Hagi, Romario, Maradona, Roberto Baggio, Stoichkov, Valderrama).
Unfortunately I think we may have seen the best of this sport for many years to come. None of the above players has a similar correspondant nowadays, maybe Messi would be like Maradona, Kaka like Roberto Baggio but in my opinion between Cristiano Ronaldo and Gianfranco Zola is not much of a difference and Zola was not a very big name in 94.