RRI Sports Club: Obituary – Niculae Nedeff

The legendary handball coach Niculae Nedeff passed away on Monday.

Florentin Căpitănescu, 26.07.2017, 13:36

The legendary handball coach Niculae Nedeff passed away on Monday, July 24, 2017. Taking into account the great number of titles he won with Romania’s national teams, Nedeff’s record is the most impressive in world handball.

Born in Bucharest on September 26, 1928 Niculae Nedeff completed his secondary education at the Prince Carol College, where he played basketball, football, rugby, volleyball and handball. In 1949 he began his university studies at the Institute for Physical Culture in Bucharest, also being signed up as a basketball player by the club of the Army’s Central House, today known as the Steaua Club. Two years later Niculae Nedeff took up the post of handball player as a civilian employee with the club’s handball section. He won several national titles under the supervision of professor Ioan Kunst Ghermanescu.

As a coach, Nedeff distinguished himself as early as the time when a handball lineup had 11 players on the court. With Romania’s national team, Nedeff won three world titles with the women’s team in 1956 in Germany and in 1960 in the Netherlands. The third title was won in Bucharest in 1962, when a handball lineup was reduced to 7 players. Added to that were four world titles in the men’s competition, in the Federal Republic of Germany in 1961, then in Czechoslovakia in 1964, in France in 1970 and in the German Democratic Republic in 1974. Niculae Nedeff’s record also includes the silver medals he won in the men’s world championships held in 1959 in Austria and in 1967 in Sweden. Adding to all that are four Olympic medals, all in the men’s competition: silver in Montreal in 1976 and bronze in Munich in 1972, in Moscow in 1980 and in Los Angeles in 1984.

Having officially retired, Niculae Nedeff continued his activity as a coach in Antibes, France and in Eisenach, Germany. He was a member of the Executive Committee of Romania’s Olympic Committee as well as a member of the Federal Bureau and the Central College of Coaches with the Romanian Handball Federation.