Mircea David

Mircea David
Personal information
Date of birth	16 October 1914
Place of birth	Sinaia, Prahova County, Romania
Date of death	12 October 1993 (aged 78)
Place of death	Iaşi, Romania
Height	1.75 m (5 ft 9 in)
Position(s)	Goalkeeper
Youth career
1929–1933	CA Oradea
Senior career*
Years	Team
1933–1938	CA Oradea
1938–1947	Venus București
1947–1948	23 August Lugoj
1948–1951	IC Oradea
Total
International career
1936–1943	Romania
Managerial career
1952–1960	Politehnica Iași
	*Club domestic league appearances and goals

Mircea David (16 October 1914 – 12 October 1993) was a

goalkeeper. After a match between Romania and Italy, played in Rome, he was nicknamed by the Italian football fans Il Dio, because of his incredible saves.^[2] He was a member of the Romania national football team which competed at the 1938 FIFA World Cup

, but did not play any match.

Early life

Mircea David was born in

traditional sport, similar to baseball.^[3]

After a time, he started to play football with his older friends. But after a while, bored because he was often selected as a

goalkeeper, he refused to play football and he went to gymnastics.^[3]

In the summer holiday, his father bought him a

goalkeeper.^[3]

Career

Club career

In 1933, he started his senior career at

Venus București together with his teammate Gusztáv Juhász because the club was in a financial crisis

.

In his first season at

Venus București, he won the Romanian championship with his team. In the next season, he repeated the performance. He remained at Venus until 1947, when he left the Bucharest-based team for 23 August a team from Lugoj

.

In 1948, he returned to his first club, renamed

IC Oradea, to win for the third time Divizia A

. In 1952, he retired from playing.

Manager career

After his retirement as a player, Mircea David began his managerial career at

Divizia A in 1960, he renounced to be a manager and was appointed as a member in the structure of Romanian Football Federation.^[4]

International career

David made his debut for the Romania national football team in October 1936, in a match lost against Hungary.^[5] In 1938, he was selected in the Romanian squad for the FIFA World Cup, but did not play in the two matches between Romania and Cuba.

On 14 April 1940, Mircea David was selected in the starting lineup for the match between Romania and Italy, the World Champions. The match, which took place at Stadio Nazionale PNF, was the game when David became a legend.^[2]

After a first half dominated by the Italians, David was already a hero for Romania, because of a couple of marvellous saves in front of Silvio Piola and Sergio Bertoni.^[2] Romania took the lead shortly after the break, when Iuliu Baratky scored the first goal of the match.

Despite receiving two goals from

fainted.^[2]

He continued to play after awaking and ended the match in the ground. He received praises from

Vitorio Pozzo, the only manager who won twice the FIFA World Cup. Pozzo said : "With Piola as a striker and David in the goal, a manager doesn't have any problem to win a game". He was also praised by Silvio Piola and the Italian fans, who nicknamed him "Il Dio".^[2]