Article by Alexandru Tomuțiu – Published Saturday, March 28, 2026 10:13 p.m. / Updated Saturday, March 28, 2026 10:33 p.m.
The former great goalkeeper Florin Prunea (57 years old) drew a harsh conclusion, after what Romania lost against Turkey (0-1)missing out on qualifying for the 2026 World Cup.
Florin Prunea noted the fact that Romania had only one striker experienced at the international level in Istanbul, Daniel Bîrligea, which he considers inadmissible.
Florin Prunea, upset with the situation at the national team: “What should we look for at the World Championship?”
“One striker in the national team, this is inadmissible. One striker, one! Others have five and I don't mean the caliber teams, we only have one. What should we look for at the World Championship?
Why do we only have one striker? Because nobody grows strikers in Romania anymore, nobody. Edi left the national team because his staff was not paid. I, if I was there, would do anything for him to stay. Well, you, president of the federation, when you get over a million euros net…”, said Florin Prunea, according to digisport.ro.
In addition to Daniel Bîrligea, the other top player in the team that traveled to Istanbul was Marius Coman, from UTA Arad. The other solution was David Miculescu, who replaced Bîrligea.
For the national team, the friendly match with Slovakia follows, which also missed the qualification for the World Cup, after 3-4 with Kosovo. We will play away on Tuesday 31st March from 9.45pm.
My impressions are simple: we met a team that controlled the match, even though I saw a lot of people say that Turkey beat us hard. Me, being there and seeing everything live, I saw a team that controlled the game and knew what to do in front of a team that sat on 16 meters.
They moved the ball around until they found spaces, and eventually they did.
– Adrian Prunea
