Episode IV: March 1967

June 11, 1967. Singer Ioana Radu, a big speedster, on a lawn in Ploiesti. He did not start the match. He kissed Motrok on the forehead. Victory does not wish him, it blesses him. He knows that Rapido needs levels to become a champion.

We are in the 40th minute of the match between Petrolul Ploiesti and Rapid. The Romanian player of “Petrolulu” is alone in the penalty area. Rapidists and oilmen in the stands strained the rivalry. The thought crosses their minds: a curse?! So many times “Rapid” missed the championship title! Then instantly, like a rescue, the stadium is looking for a goalkeeper: where is Rick? The goalkeeper Rike Reducanu was out of phase. The Romanian player, left alone in front of the goal, misses the shot. So Rapidul held it on June 11, 1967. “He had a heart attack, what else is there to talk about,” says Marcel Diakon. The deacon experienced a great victory on the podium. Her husband walked her from Ploiesti to Bucharest as a sign of happiness.

And Marcel Diacona tells us. He was 24 years old and grew up in Grant Bridge, in the Horseshoe.

He arrived with “Sharpele vișiniu” in Ploiesti on June 11, 1967 on a special train for speed racers. It was the 67th minute at the stadium in Ploiesti. Rushing defender Dan Coe sends the ball home. He found no other solution. Rika Reducanu paid no attention. Rika, Rika, what are you doing with us? In a panther jump, Ricke barely touches the ball with his huge hand. The ball obeys him: it does not enter the net. The bullet went past the ear again. Ploiesti Stadium sighs again, it is cherry white. Whatever rivals Ploiesti and Giulesti are, they do not want Dynamo to win the championship. They won by a margin two years in a row. But the oilmen do not even sell matches, the people of Ploešt do not want to give “alms” to the rapidists. In some rare footage from the Ploiesti match, a local resident has a sign in the stands with a carrot and the giant word Rapid written on it. It’s an eternal joke when someone is in trouble. The players of “Rapid” can also be seen on the poster, especially in decisive matches, putting them under pressure, giving it to the bar.

Marcel Diaconu saves the exact moment: The 90th minute is recorded. The final whistle blows. The fiesta begins.

0-0 Petrolul Ploiesti – Rapid Bucharest. This score brings Rapidul Champion for the first time in her life. Galeria Rapidului breaks any barriers established by the militias, tramples fences and protocols of “communist ethics and justice”. Coaches and players are held in their hands as if they have no weight. Nobody catches Rike Redukana, he runs all over the stadium with happiness.

Dances are going on, the players rise to the sky and descend like gods. They broke the curse of lost titles “by a whisker”, they escaped from too strong pressure of the political system before and after 1945. Minister Marinescu, the patron of the Venus team, who confiscated the players as a punishment for the victory – “Dynamo Militia” and “Steaua Armatei”, which was provided by the Ceausescu family itself.

At that moment, we lived exactly 44 years since Rapid’s birthday, it was June 11! 1923-1967 years. What a match!

Galeria Rapidului triumphed with Zimbru, Nea Tinel, coach Valentin Stanescu, who was “reported in the newspapers” as a nobody in the 1950s. They were close to Tamango, Rike Redukan, who juggled the ball in front of goal and ran into the opposition goal to score. They juggled the superstitious “Secretary of Defense” Dan Coe. It is said that he saw the funeral procession on the way to Ploiesti and shouted to the dead: “God bless you! Today we will win!”

Tinel Din-Burich rejoiced like children. From “Bombardier” Nicolae Georgescu, who hit the goal with his shot. Nichi Dumitriou, who played one minute and sat ten, was the “salt of Rapid’s figures”, as he was called. With Vasyl Maryan. Lupescu, Greava, Motrock, Stefan, Sava, Jamajski, Nasturescu “Misei”, Pui Ionescu, Sandu Nyagu, Codryan, called “Parpala”, Viorel Kraus, Paul Mitroi. Everyone made history in Julesti. The joy struck without exception gallerists and football players. No one fainted from the euphoria. Marcel Diaconu says that he was waiting for the train, they were waiting for the buses. The world stopped.

Marcel Diaconu remembers that moment. He wanted to get to Pidkova faster, along the Grant Bridge. There were 10,000 sprinters in the stands.

The players left on their bus and met again at the Grant Bridge. Some of the fans were sardines on the train, climbing its steps in droves to get to Grant Bridge faster. The CFR locomotives had “Champions” written on them. On the balconies, when you enter Bucharest, you can see flags, panties, dresses, t-shirts, ties, everything you could find at home, cherry blossoms.

march

Marcel Diaconu was getting on the bus. He could not wait for everyone: players, fans of “Astoria” to be at the holiday. But he heard that there was a triumphal march on foot! He said to himself: I take it like the apostles on foot, carrying the news of the championship victory from Ploiesti to Grant Bridge. So he did. It lasted ten hours. Until 4-5 in the morning!

At that time, Ion Kirile wrote an article for Sportul: “Rapid is the champion. Quickly the smallest, with its fragile players – most of them are the fruit of a difficult childhood, during the difficult years of the war. He quickly managed to become “big” and put on the jersey of his dreams with the help of a weapon of spontaneous intelligence forged for decades around the Grant Bridge. Stunned by the incident, he is said to have walked through Giulio that night and decided to write The Voice of Train Wheels, the iconic book of the Rapid.

Both Marcel Diaconu and about a thousand high-speed racers set off on foot to Bucharest with Tudorica in the lead.

They refueled: beer, wine, Jamaica, they sang with passion and longing, at the top of their lungs. And in Romanetska, what a time it was! Even the people from the “Românești” restaurant welcomed them with gâtlei things: beer, water, wine. Traffic on DN1 was stopped because it was Žulesti. The militia was restrained, it is better not to know anything about this “out of mind”. No one took photos of this pilgrimage, no one filmed the road. And, actually, who needs evidence, because everyone who has a cherry tree knows this road.

Thousands of speeding cars turned night into day on the Grant Bridge. And the Apostles also arrived there around 4-5 o’clock

They brought word that the Rapid had been reborn. Grant Bridge, on the steps, on the railings, was an absolute party place. Great failures were mentioned, unexpected victories were mentioned. The players and the gallery have no difference, they are unmanageable, you can’t know what will be the next move, but from now on, no one and nothing stands in the way of the rapid. What audacity it was to hear and see that night: “Fast champion, without mercy and charity!”. Someone wrote a slogan on the wall of the Giulesti Theater and on the Grant Bridge. By this word, he directly meant backroom agreements of party activists so that “Dynamo” and “Steaua” came to the first place in the rating: teams with “dead legs”, buying arbitrations, blackmailing players. The fans presented the football players with a cup in cherry color, which has been kept since 1965. The gallery, in all its poverty, had been collecting money since 1965.

Rapid was compared to Bobby Charlton’s England, Moore, who won the world championship that year, beating Beckenbauer’s German, Overath.

Valentyn Stenescu’s Rapid were found to be playing amazingly, something different: Rapid playing a 4-4-2, dominating the Pride and finding the right place for so many Rapid stars, Nasturescu and Codrianu retired, and Dumitriou and Ionescu leading the way , instead of the classic 4. -2-4. The search for Rapid’s formula for success, the unpredictable, has begun. The rating was investigated. The team “Rapid” was not very determined in the first round, started with a series of draws, but, as usual, did not make big mistakes. He read all this, – commented Marcel Diacona. How could they not know, every step from Ploiesti to Bucharest, and since then for so many years, Marcel Diaconu has remained with Rapidul. For worse and for better.

Here’s what Sportul wrote in 1967, see what kind of doctors they were, see an analysis of Rapid Campion’s progress in 1966-7:

“The victory came only on the 5th stage. After 3 draws and a loss, the fast players outplayed the players from Poly Iasi, scoring 8 goals. That score (8-1) would also be the championship score. In the tour of 13 matches, the Rapidists had a positive result: 6 wins, 3 draws and 4 losses. The best ranking in the tour was after the 11th stage, when the people of Julesti rose to the 3rd place. That performance came on the back of a 3-0 win over Stella in Giulietta. The comeback was almost entirely theirs. The fast team took the lead after stage 16 and held it until the end of the season. In the second part of the championship, they won 7, drew 5 and lost only one.”

The numbers? Everyone knows success, but it’s hard when you go through hell. Marcel Diaconu also says that no one from the FRF or from Dynamo thought that Rapidul would become a champion. They always said: it will hit, it will stumble, that’s their style.

After becoming a champion, Rapidul found its style.

He wasn’t lying.

So, becoming a champion, Rapid returned to Rapid unhappiness, irritations, breaks.

In the Cup, Rapid was beaten by Foresta Felticheni from Division 3. Agony.

In the European Champions Cup, they beat Trakia (Plovdiv), but lost to Turin Juventus with a score of 0:0, 0:1. “We’re good!”

Catastrophe took 9th place in the 1967-68 Championship.

In the Cup with “Dynamo” 1:3, but the worst thing is that Nyagu misses from 11 m.

Ion Ionescu leaves for Aachen. Ion Motroc in Turkey.

In 1968, Zimbru’s Valentin Stanescu was fired because he had no results, he was not interested in the team, says the leadership of the Ministry of Transport, which had the team’s budget.

Dumitriu and Yamajski go to Brasov, summoned by Zimbra.

Nyagu, Koe, Lupescu, Dumitriou, Nyagu have been playing in the World Cup team in Mexico since 1970, but in the Rapid Cup they lost to the team from Gerla from the 3rd division.

In UEFA, Rapid lost to Vitoria Setúbal 7-2. The Romanian Federation forbids the Rapid team from participating in European Cups, as it makes a mockery of the dictatorship with such performances abroad.

In the championship of 1970-71, “Brasov”, coached by Valentin Stanescu, defeated “Rapidul” in Giulesti with a score of 3:1. Grant Bridge mental breakdown: ‘Nea Tinel just to make fun of us?’

Coe goes to Belgium. It will soon be officially declared a “suicide.” Juleshti cries and howls in pain. He always believed that Ceausescu killed him because he refused to go to Steaua, for his courage to speak out against the dictator’s “madness”. And he dedicated a song that can still be heard in the stadium today: “Greetings from old Troe, In honor of Dan Coe. And again it is allowed: Aha!”

The great triumph has witnesses even today. Marcel Diaconu is one of them. And the 1967 champion team says it like poetry: Rico Raducanu, Marin Andrei, Dan Coe, Nicolae Lupescu, Ilie Greavu, Ion Motrock, Bebe Nesturescu, Constantin Jamajski, Constantin Dinu-Buric, Teo Codreanu, Nae Georgescu, Viorel Kraus, Sandu Nyagu , Puiu Ionescu, Nichi Dumitriou. Trainers: Valentin Stanculescu and Victor Stanculescu.

See also:

• Episode I: Rapid Bucharest: Who Was First? Team or gallery? VIDEO story by Pompiliu Konstantin, author of the book Rapidism
• Episode II: “We always had a hurricane coming, who would protect us?” This is the glory of Fast forever – an insider of the never-ending story. VIDEO STORY Naye Stanchiu, defending champion of “Rapid”.
• Episode III: “Rapid” played for the people, the communists fought for blackmail – VIDEO story Ion Ionescu, striker of the champion “Rapid” in 1967
• The series of multimedia stories “Portile yet not” was created with the support of SUPERBET.