 Ionescu with Alemannia Aachen | |||
| Personal information | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Full name | Ion Gheorghe Ionescu | ||
| Date of birth | (1938-04-05)5 April 1938 (age 87) | ||
| Place of birth | Bucharest, Romania | ||
| Height | 1.74 m (5 ft 9 in) | ||
| Position(s) | Forward | ||
| Youth career | |||
| Rapid București | |||
| Senior career* | |||
| Years | Team | Apps | (Gls) |
| 1960–1968 | Rapid București | 183 | (107) |
| 1968–1970 | Alemannia Aachen | 46 | (10) |
| 1970 | Crișul Oradea | 1 | (0) |
| 1970–1972 | Cercle Brugge | 30 | (8) |
| Total | 260 | (125) | |
| International career | |||
| 1962–1969 | Romania[a] | 24 | (5) |
| Managerial career | |||
| 1978–1979 | Gloria Buzău | ||
| 1980–1981 | Rapid București | ||
| *Club domestic league appearances and goals | |||
Ion Gheorghe Ionescu (born 5 April 1938) is a Romanian formerfootballstriker.[3]
Ion Gheorghe Ionescu, nicknamed "Puiu" was born on 5 April 1938 inBucharest, Romania, growing up in theCotroceni neighborhood.[4][5][6] He made hisDivizia A debut, playing forRapid București under coachIon Mihăilescu on 30 October 1960 in a 2–0 loss in front ofMinerul Lupeni.[4][7]
_1963.jpg)
He spent eight seasons at Rapid, making a successful couple in the team's offence withEmil Dumitriu, winning two times the top-goalscorer of Divizia A title in the1962–63 season with 20 goals and in1965–66 with 24 goals.[4][5][6] In the1966–67 season, under the guidance of coachValentin Stănescu he helped Rapid win the first league title in the club's history, being the team's top-goalscorer with 15 goals scored in 22 matches.[4][5][8][9] In the following season he appeared in four matches in the1967–68 European Cup campaign, scoring one goal againstTrakia Plovdiv which helped Rapid advance to the following round where they were eliminated byJuventus.[4][10] Ionescu reached threeCupa României finals, playing in the last two, the first two from1961 and1962 under the guidance of coach Ion Mihăilescu were lost in front ofArieșul Turda respectivelySteaua București while at the one from1968 he was coached by Stănescu in the loss withDinamo București.[11][12][13] For the way he played in 1967, Ionescu was placed fourth in the ranking for theRomanian Footballer of the Year award.[14]
In October 1967 Rapid played a friendly game againstAlemannia Aachen in which Ionescu scored two goals and in DecemberRomania's national team played a friendly against Aachen in which Ionescu scored three goals.[6][15] These five goals impressed the leaders of the German club who wanted to transfer Ionescu to their team.[6][15] DuringRomania's communist era, transfers of Romanian footballers outside the country were rarely allowed, Ionescu had to convince theRomanian Football Federation to allow the transfer and he managed to do so after having a meeting with communist politicianGheorghe Apostol who talked toLeonte Răutu and helped Ionescu receive approval for his transfer inGermany, thus becoming the first Romanian footballer who obtained in the communist regime the right to play abroad.[5][6][15] Aachen paid $100,000 and a bus for his transfer.[4][5][6][15] Ionescu made hisBundesliga debut on 17 August 1968 under coachMichael Pfeiffer in a 4–1 away victory againstNürnberg.[16][17] In the following round he scored a double in a 4–2 home win overEintracht Frankfurt.[16] He netted a total of seven goals in 24 league matches by the end of his first season spent at the club, including another brace in 4–0 againstTSV 1860 Munich, making a successful couple in the team's offence withRoger Claessen, helping Aachen finish second in the championship.[4][5][6][15]
After two years spent inWest Germany at Alemannia Aachen, Ionescu came back in Romania to play forCrișul Oradea where he made his last Divizia A appearance on 28 June 1970 in a 0–0 withDinamo Bacău, having a total of 184 matches in which he scored 107 goals in the competition.[4][5] He ended his career by playing two seasons in Belgium atCercle Brugge, a club he helped promote from the second to the first league.[4][5]
Ionescu played 15 games at international level forRomania, making his debut on 23 December 1962 when coachSilviu Ploeșteanu sent him on the field at half-time to replaceCicerone Manolache in a friendly which ended with a 3–1 loss againstMorocco.[1][18] His following three games were at the1966 World Cup qualifiers.[1] In a friendly againstGreece which ended with a 2–1 victory, Ionescu scored his first two goals for the national team.[1][19] His following three games were at theEuro 1968 qualifiers in which he scored two goals in a 7–0 victory againstCyprus.[1][20] Ionescu's last game for the national team was a 2–2 againstGreece at the1970 World Cup qualifiers.[1][21] Ionescu also played nine games forRomania's Olympic team, being chosen by coach Ploeșteanu to be part of the1964 Summer Olympics squad fromTokyo where he played four games and scored one goal in a 3–1 victory againstMexico helping the team finish on the fifth place.[2][22]
| # | Date | Venue | Cap | Opponent | Score | Result | Competition |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 8 March 1967 | Leoforos Alexandras Stadium,Athens,Greece | 7 |  Greece | 1–1 | 2–1 | Friendly |
| 2 | 2–1 | ||||||
| 3 | 23 April 1967 | 23 August Stadium,Bucharest,Romania | 8 |  Cyprus | 4–0 | 7–0 | Euro 1968 qualifiers |
| 4 | 7–0 |
Ionescu started his managerial career in 1978 atDivizia B club,Gloria Buzău which he helped promote by the end of the season toDivizia A where he coached it the full1978–79 season.[6][23] He had another experience atRapid București, afterwards retiring from his coaching activity and working as alawyer and for a short while as ajudge.[6]
Rapid București
Alemannia Aachen
Cercle Brugge
Gloria Buzău
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