How high Romania reached at the first World Cup in 1930. The story of the team that made history in Uruguay

In truth, Romania has always taken international pride in its national football team, although it hasn’t always had concrete reasons to do so. Even so, there were years when pride was more than justified, as you’ll see below.

The first time Romania made a name for itself at the World Cup was in the very first edition, held in Uruguay in 1930.

The first victory of Romanian footballers at the 1930 World Cup

In 1930, at the first edition of the World Cup, our country achieved a victory that would put it on the map of international football. They managed to beat Peru 3-1.

However, luck didn’t strike twice, so they lost to the host nation, Uruguay, 4-0.

“Arriving in Montevideo, the Romanian team was the object of particular attention. The draw was not in our favour. Romania fell into the third series, alongside Peru and Uruguay, the 1924 and 1928 Olympic champions. The matches have been fixed for Monday 14 and Tuesday 22 July. Romania was considered a negligible quantity.

The Peruvians took the field confident of victory, ironic, with a sarcastic smile of unquestionable superiority over the Balkans, who only legitimized their existence on the field out of a desire to take a boat ride.

The outbreak of hostilities overturned the calculations. After leading 1-0 at halftime, Romania won the match 3-1, and took the first win of the series. Covaci, Deșiu and Stanciu scored. The opponents won through an excess of brutality, even breaking the leg of a Romanian player”, according to the July 24, 1930 issue of the magazine “Realitatea ilustrată”, according to truth.ro.

The world’s first world football championship was held between 13-30 July, Uruguay, as this country had won the football trophy at the 1928 Olympic Games.

The following 13 countries took part in this first edition, seven from South America and four from Europe: Uruguay, Argentina, United States of America, Yugoslavia, Chile, Brazil, France, Romania, Paraguay, Peru, Belgium, Bolivia and Mexico.

Although nowadays the World Cup is a resounding event when it happens, the first edition brought only 300 supporters to the stadiums.

“Our country made a good impression”

The newspapers of the time praised our country’s unbeatable football performance at the time. “In the first match, they managed the beautiful performance of beating Peru 3-1, a victory that focused the attention of the soccer world on the Romanian team for a moment, making the Romanian team eagerly await their match against the Uruguayans, especially since they had just beaten the Peruvians 1-0.

The match ended with Uruguay winning 4-0. This is easily explained. The Romanians entered the arena somewhat intimidated. They were playing for the first time, in front of a crowd of a hundred thousand spectators, exuberant and noisy, who were all on the side of their countrymen.

And the Uruguayans took advantage and scored four goals right at the start of the game. By half-time our players had settled into the environment.

In the second half they came back, dominated, but both sides did not score anything more”, it is stated in the August 14, 1930 issue of the magazine “Realitatea ilustrata”, according to the source quoted above.

Uruguay was to win the first official World Cup after defeating Argentina 4-2.

A short history of Romania’s national team at the World Cup

Immediately after their success at the 1930 World Cup, Romania’s national team managed to qualify for seven more finals over the years, namely 1934 – round 1 (Italy), 1938 – round 1 (France), 1970 – round 1 (Mexico), 1990 – round 2 (Italy), 1994 – quarter-finals (USA) and in 1998 (France), where they reached the round of 16.

In 2002, 2010, 2014 and 2018, Romania’s national team failed to achieve any more.

It remains to be seen whether our country’s fortunes will change in the future.