Steaua after 40 years
It’s been 40 years since Steaua Bucharest won the European Champions Cup. I’m MI with more, in this report by Ştefan Stoica
Ştefan Stoica, 07.05.2026, 13:50
May 7, 1986, marks a defining moment in Romanian football. Four decades ago, the national champion, Steaua Bucharest, defeated the famous Spanish team FC Barcelona 2–0 in the final of the European Champions Cup, as the continent’s premier interclub competition was then known. The match was played at the “Ramon Sanchez Pizjuan” stadium in Seville (Spain), which was, naturally, hostile to the Bucharest team. The score was 0-0 after 90 minutes and two extra-time periods, so the match was decided by a penalty shootout. Steaua missed twice, but their goalkeeper, Helmut Duckadam, made history by saving all four penalties taken by the Catalan powerhouse. Lăcătuş and Balint scored for Steaua. For the first time ever, European football’’s top trophy found its way into the trophy case of a club from the Communist East.
The second Communist team to win the European Cup was Red Star Belgrade, which also featured the great defender Miodrag Belodedici, at that time the only European player with two trophies to his name. Steaua’s success was not a flash in the pan: the Bucharest team won the European Super Cup in 1987 after defeating another legendary Eastern European team, Dynamo Kyiv, 1-0; they reached the European Cup semifinals in 1988, and a year later played in its second European Cup final, which it lost decisively, 4-0, to the legendary Italian side AC Milan. It also played in the Intercontinental Cup final, falling to the Argentines of River Plate.
Steaua Bucharest dominated Romanian football in the second half of the 1980s and, thanks to its international success, became one of the most respected and feared teams on the continent. The members of the 1986 Steaua football team were honored on Wednesday in a plenary session of the Chamber of Deputies, marking the 40th anniversary of their victory in the European Champions Cup. Former players and members of the coaching staff Dumitru Stângaciu, Anton Weissenbacher, Adrian Bumbescu, Miodrag Belodedici, Gavril Pele Balint, Tudorel Stoica, Anghel Iordănescu, Marius Lăcătuş, Victor Piţurcă, Ştefan Iovan, Ladislau Boloni, Mihail Majearu, Constantin Pistol, Marin Radu, Vasile Iordache, and Florentin Marinescu attended a brief session from the Chamber of Deputies’ plenary gallery and received a standing ovation from the lawmakers present in the chamber.
A bill has also been introduced to grant all members of the Steaua ’86 team a merit award from the Romanian state. The Steaua players and coaches were also honored by the Romanian presidency for one of the greatest achievements in the history of Romanian sports. Unfortunately, the Steaua 1986 family has lost the great coach Emerich Ienei, Duckadam, the hero of Seville, Ilie Bărbulescu, and Lucian Bălan. These exceptional results make Steaua the most successful football club in Romania. Moreover, it was that generation—with the late Ienei as its architect—that laid the foundation for the national team that would go on to participate in three consecutive World Cups in the 1990s. (MI)
