Ion Timofte

Early years and Politehnica Timișoara

Timofte was born on 16 December 1967 in Anina, Romania and began playing junior-level football at local club Minerul, starting his senior career at the same team in Divizia C. In 1988 he went to play for Divizia B side CSM Reșița. His talent was noticed by coach Constantin Rădulescu who brought him to Politehnica Timișoara where he made his Divizia A debut on 23 August 1989 in a 2–1 home loss to Bihor Oradea. Rădulescu also used him in all four matches in the 1990–91 UEFA Cup campaign where they eliminated in the first round Atlético Madrid with 2–1 on aggregate, being defeated in the next one by Sporting Lisbon. Timofte made his last Divizia A appearance on 23 June 1991 in a 1–0 away loss to Universitatea Cluj, totaling 65 matches with 19 goals in the competition, all of them for Politehnica.

Porto

In 1991, Timofte joined Portuguese side Porto where he was recommended by Mircea Lucescu and they were also impressed when they watched him scoring for Romania in a friendly against Spain. He made his Primeira Liga debut on 24 August as coach Carlos Alberto Silva used him as a starter in a 2–0 away victory against Estoril in which he opened the score. He would go on to score in the following round in a 5–0 victory against União Torreense, then in January 1992 he managed a brace in another 5–0 win, this time against Estoril. By the end of the season he scored the decisive goal with his right-foot, even though he was a lefty,…

Timofte played 10 matches in which he scored once for Romania, making his debut on 3 April 1991 when coach Mircea Rădulescu sent him in the 89th minute to replace Ioan Lupescu in a 0–0 away draw against Switzerland in the Euro 1992 qualifiers. In his following game he opened the score in a 2–0 friendly win against Spain after receiving a cross from Ioan Sabău and striking the ball with a volley that defeated goalkeeper Andoni Zubizarreta. Afterwards he played two more games in the Euro 1992 qualifiers, a win over Scotland and a draw against Bulgaria. Subsequently, Timofte played in a 5–1 home win over Wales in the successful 1994 World Cup qualifiers, but he was surprisingly omitted by coach Anghel Iordănescu from the squad that went to the final tournament. His last two appearances were a draw against Poland and a win over Slovakia in the Euro 1996 qualifiers, but could not be part of the final tournament squad due to an injury.

Scores and results list Romania's goal tally first, score column indicates score after each Timofte goal.

Porto

Primeira Divisão: 1991–92, 1992–93 Taça de Portugal: 1993–94 Supertaça Cândido de Oliveira: 1991, 1993 Boavista

Taça de Portugal: 1996–97 Supertaça Cândido de Oliveira: 1997