NOT just Hagi » Mircea Lucescu made another surprise proposal for his successor on the national team bench
Article by Ovidiu Minea – Published Friday, April 10, 2026 5:42 p.m. / Updated Friday, April 10, 2026 5:51 p.m.
Buried todayMircea Lucescu was preoccupied with the fate of Romania's national football team until the last days of his life. Aware that he can no longer return to the technical bench, “Il Luce” presented his point of view regarding the name of the one who would be the most destined to follow him at the helm of the tricolors and said two names: Hagi and Pancu.
Deceased at the age of 80, Mircea Lucescu was buried with military honors on April 10, at the Bellu Cemetery in Bucharest.
Pancu was also a variant for the dam with Turkey
Although he greatly appreciated the one who has long been regarded as a great favorite to take his place, Gică Hagi, Lucescu also had another option, Daniel Pancu. The proposal had been shelved immediately after it was found out that Lucescu had leukemia.
In the event that “Il Luce” could not prepare the dam in Turkey, Pancu was an option to train the tricolors for the duel at the Beşiktaş arena, which the current CFR Cluj technician also played. As Lucescu went over the doctors' recommendations to avoid stress and went to Istanbul, the Pancone version did not materialize.
The relationship between Mircea Lucescu and Daniel Pancu
Lucescu had Pancu as his student for almost four years, at two teams, Rapid Bucharest and Beşiktaș Istanbul. Both experiences were successful, being crowned with champion titles, at Rapid in 1999 and Beşiktaş in 2003.
The two also collaborated as coaches, during the period when “Il Luce” was the selector of the senior team, and Pancone led the youth team. Pancu always admitted that Mircea Lucescu was his mentor, the relationship between the two being always close, even if the CFR technician refused to leave Beşiktaş for Shakhtior when Mircea cel Mare moved to Ukraine.
The relationship between Lucescu and Hagi
Lucescu also had a very close relationship with Gică Hagi, whom he released to the national team, starting him, at 18, in a match against Norway, played in Oslo.
“Il Luce” also worked with “The King” in Brescia, in the period 1992-1994, many voices saying that the stratospheric form displayed by Hagi at the 1994 World Cup was due to Lucescu. The two great personalities of Romanian football also collaborated at Galatasaray Istanbul, when they won the European Super Cup in 2020, after a final with Real Madrid.
