Ilie Datcu

Ilie Datcu (born 20 July 1937) is a Romanian former professional football player and coach who played as a goalkeeper, most notably for Dinamo București and Fenerbahçe.

Club career Datcu was born on 20 July 1937 in Bucharest, Romania. He began playing football at the junior squads of Constructorul București in 1950, four years later going to Metalul Câmpina and then joining Progresul CPCS București. He started his senior career in 1958 at Divizia B team Dinamo Obor București.

Datcu went to play for Dinamo București where he made his Divizia A debut on 20 August 1961 in a 4–3 away loss against Dinamo Pitești. In the following three seasons, Datcu won another three titles. In the 1964 final, Ionescu played him for the first 85 minutes, then replaced him with Iuliu Uțu in the 5–3 victory against rivals Steaua București, but in 1968, coach Bazil Marian did not use him in the 3–1 win over Rapid București. He also made some performances in European competitions with Dinamo as in the 1963–64 European Cup campaign he kept two clean sheets in the 3–0 aggregate win over East Germany champion, Motor Jena, being eliminated in the next round by Real Madrid. He subsequently appeared in a historical 2–1 win over Inter Milan in the 1965–66 edition who were the winners of the last two editions of the competition.

In 1969, aged 31, Datcu went to play in Turkey for Fenerbahçe where in his first season he was coached by Traian Ionescu and was teammates with Ion Nunweiller, all of them previously working together at Dinamo. They won the 1969–70 Turkish League in which Datcu made 29 appearances, conceding only six goals, and also kept a clean sheet in the 1–0 victory in the TSYD Cup final against Beşiktaş. He played two matches in the Euro 1968 qualifiers.

Managerial career Datcu started his managerial career at Fenerbahçe in 1976. In the 1982–83 Turkish Second League season, he helped Fatih Karagümrük gain promotion to the first league after an absence of 20 years. He also worked as a goalkeeper coach, first at Fenerbahçe, where he noticed and promoted Rüştü Reçber, then at Beşiktaş, being brought there by his former teammate from Dinamo and the national team, Mircea Lucescu. He also holds Turkish citizenship under the name İlyas Datça.

Honours Player Dinamo Obor București Cupa României runner-up: 1959–60 Dinamo București Divizia A: 1961–62, 1962–63, 1963–64, 1964–65 Cupa României: 1963–64, 1967–68 Fenerbahçe Turkish League: 1969–70, 1973–74, 1974–75 Turkish Cup: 1973–74 Turkish Super Cup: 1973 Prime Minister's Cup: 1973

Manager Fatih Karagümrük Turkish Second League: 1982–83