Anghel Iordănescu

Iordănescu was born on 4 May 1950 in Bucharest, Romania, growing up in the Giulești neighborhood. As a child, he was a fan of Steaua București, a team for which he began playing junior-level football in 1960 at the age of 10. Iordănescu made his Divizia A debut at age 18 under coach Ștefan Kovács on 17 November 1968 in a 2–1 home loss to Politehnica Iași. The team won the 1968–69 Cupa României at the end of his first season, but he did not play in the final. He helped the club win the 1975–76 and 1977–78 championship titles under coach Emerich Jenei, being the team's top-scorer on both occasions with 23 and 19 goals respectively. Iordănescu also helped them win four more Cupa României trophies, playing in all the finals, scoring the only goal of the 1–0 victory against CSU Galați in the 1976 final. During his time with The Military Men, he also played 19 games and scored one goal in European competitions. He took part in the 1971–72 European Cup Winners' Cup campaign, playing all six games as the team reached the quarter-finals by eliminating Hibernians and Barcelona, being eliminated after 1–1 on aggregate on the away goal rule by Bayern Munich. For the way he played in 1976, Iordănescu was placed third in the ranking for the Romanian Footballer of the Year award, and in 1980, he was runner-up behind teammate Marcel Răducanu. In the 1981–82 season, he was the top-scorer of the league with 20 goals netted. Iordănescu's last Divizia A appearance occurred on 12 June 1982 in…

Iordănescu made a total of 57 appearances for Romania, serving as captain in nine of them and scoring 21 goals. He made his debut under coach Angelo Niculescu on 22 September 1971 and opened the scoring in a 4–0 away victory against Finland during the 1972 Euro qualifiers. In those qualifiers, he played in another two victories against Czechoslovakia and Wales, but also in two draws in the quarter-finals against Hungary, who advanced to the final tournament. Subsequently, he played five matches in the 1974 World Cup qualifiers and scored a double in a 3–1 victory against Greece during the 1973–76 Balkan Cup. Iordănescu made four appearances during the Euro 1976 qualifiers, scoring once in a 2–2 draw against Spain, before playing four additional matches in the Euro 1980 qualifiers where he scored a goal in both the win and the loss against Yugoslavia. He helped Romania win the 1977–80 Balkan Cup by being the top-scorer of the tournament with six goals, of which one was scored in a win against Turkey, two were in two matches against Bulgaria, a victory and a draw respectively, and a hat-trick in the second leg of the final to defeat Yugoslavia 4–3 on aggregate. Iordănescu played six matches in the 1982 World Cup qualifiers, netting one goal in a 1–1 draw against Norway and the decisive goal in the 2–1 win over England.

Steaua București and Anorthosis Famagusta

In 1984, Iordănescu became a junior coach at Steaua București. However, he soon became an assistant for the senior squad after Florin Halagian was replaced by Emerich Jenei. During his time with Jenei, they won the 1984–85 and 1985–86 Divizia A titles, the 1984–85 Cupa României and the 1985–86 European Cup. After Jenei was appointed as Romania's manager in 1986, Iordănescu became Steaua's new head coach. From this new position, his first achievement was winning the 1986 European Super Cup, after a 1–0 victory against Dynamo Kyiv, courtesy of a goal scored by Gheorghe Hagi. He also led them in the 1–0 loss to River Plate in the 1986 Intercontinental Cup. Subsequently, during the 1987–88 European Cup, Steaua eliminated MTK Budapest, Omonia Nicosia and Rangers to reach the semi-finals where they were defeated 2–0 on aggregate by Benfica. In the 1988–89 European Cup campaign, they got past Sparta Prague, Spartak Moscow, IFK Göteborg and Galatasaray, reaching the final where they lost 4–0 to Arrigo Sacchi's AC Milan. Domestically, Iordănescu helped the team win three consecutive Divizia A titles while remaining undefeated in the 1986–87, 1987–88 and 1988–89 seasons. Steaua had 104 consecutive league matches without suffering a loss. Under his leadership, they also won the 1986–87 and 1988–89 Cupa României trophies, both after 1–0 victories in the finals against rivals Dinamo București, thanks to goals netted by László Bölöni and…

In 2004, Iordănescu became a member of the Social Democratic Party. On 6 February 2008, he assumed office in the Romanian Senate. In January 2009, Iordănescu opted to serve as an independent senator, and in October the same year he joined the National Union for the Progress of Romania. During the 2012 Romanian local elections, he ran for Mayor of Bucharest, but earned only 1.5% of the votes.