Sports Weekend

Florin Orban, 31.07.2020, 11:17

On Thursday
Romanian Mircea Lucescu was appointed head coach of Ukrainian football club
Dinamo Kiev. He signed a two-year contract with the possibility of a one-year
extension. Lucescu had successful talks with the club president, Igor Surkis,
but was very close to giving up, due to the fans’ protests. Surkis subsequently
persuaded Lucescu to start training the Ukrainian vice-champions, after writing
history years ago with their rivals, FC Shakhtar Donestk.

The General
Assembly of the Romanian Professional Football League on Thursday decided to
call on the Romanian Football Federation an extension for the League 1
championship until August 18, to be able to account for the matches delayed in
the wake of the coronavirus crisis, the League Secretary General Justin Stefan
said at the end of the meeting. The main goal of the Professional Football
League is to finalize the domestic championship on the pitch, with the option
of calling off matches in Group 2, in the event new infection cases are
reported.

Wednesday and
Thursday saw matches counting towards the 12th round of the group
phase. On Wednesday, in Ploiesti, Chindia Targoviste won 3-1 against Academica
Clinceni, while FC Hermannstadt won 2-nil against Viitorul Constanta at home. On
Thursday, Politehnica Iasi won narrowly 2-1 the home turf match against FC
Voluntari. This weekend, in Group 1, FCSB is playing CFR Cluj in a match
counting towards the 8th round. The match was originally scheduled
for July 18, but was postponed after one of CFR’s players got infected with
COVID-19.

In League 2, on
Saturday, CS Mioveni is playing Petrolul Ploiesti in Group 2. Rapid Bucharest
will take on Turris Turnu Magurele, while FC Arges will play UTA Arad. UTA
ranks first with 29 points, followed by CS Mioveni with 27, FC Arges with 26,
Turris with 25, Rapid with 24 and Petrolul with 22. The top two teams will be
promoted to League 1, while the team in third place will move to the playoffs.

(Translated by
V. Palcu)