Romania Profile

Friday 18th May 2001

Colours: Yellow with Blue Trim
Nicknames: The Oaks
Major Honours: European Nations Cup (2001, 2002)

Coach: Predictably their coach is an eager Frenchman Bernard Charreyre. He was a coach in Languedoc till the French Federation packed him off to Romania in January 2002. He was welcomed with open arms in Romania, rightly so - he came in on the back of a 81-9 defeat by Wales and a 134-0 defeat by England.

Captain: 29-year-old centre Romeo Gontineac has won nearly 50 caps for the Oaks, adding experience and creativity to their midfield. He will, as always, be a key man for Romania.

Player(s) to watch: It is significant that Romanian forwards are in greater demand than their backs. That is how their game has largely been - tough, unimaginative forwards who do tight phases well - much as the Pumas used to be. They are more expansive now but have not had development to equal the that of the Pumas. But then the captain Romeo Gontineac is a centre who plays for Aurillac and fly-half Ionut Tofan plays for the Paris Racing Club.

Profile: Romania have long been one of the stronger European teams outside of the Six Nations tournament. In the late 1970s and early 1980s Romania were probably the strongest of the lesser European nations and many have felt it was wrong for the rugby powers to fail to bring them in to top-flight competition during their heyday.

However, with the deterioration of the domestic political and economic situation in the country in the 1980s, Romanian rugby suffered, especially given rugby's close affiliations with the military and indeed a number of players lost their lives during the 1989 revolution.

Unexpectedly, they came out of the 1999 World Cup with a win under their belt, as their massive forwards steamrollered the United States to set up a 27-25 victory that was hoped would give new impetus to the game in Romania.

Sadly Romania's international progress continues to be hampered by a dire lack of resources which sees many of their players go abroad to the likes of France to earn a living and little, or no, major development programmes.

They have now been caught by the likes of Georgia who defeated them to take the 2001 European Nations Cup, the lower-level Six Nations.

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