Aurel Guga
Encyclopedia
Aurel Guga was a Romania
n football
player. Regarded as one of the most talented and versatile players of the early 1920s, Guga was the first captain of the Romania football team
.
, on 10th August 1898 (despite some sources claim that he was born in 1900), Guga finished his highschool in Oraviţa, before moving to Lugoj. Because of World War I
he could not start playing football until 1919, when he was 21. He started at the local club, Vulturii Lugoj, but stayed only one year because he wanted to apply for the Commercial Academy from Cluj.
, a club formed one year earlier by the "Sports Society of University Students". At the time, he only played with his team in local competitions since there was not any football championship at a national level. In January 1922, a Viennese newspaper dedicated a full-page article to him, calling him "an exceptional forward player".
Sometime in October or November 1923, U Cluj got to play its first tournament abroad, at the invitation of the Grenoble
municipality for the opening of their new stadium. U Cluj first played in Lyon, with a local team, managing to win with 5-2; Aurel Guga scored three times. The next day, the French press wrote that "he is a world-class player". Since there were rumors at the times about a friendly between the England national team
and a team of selected players from the continent, Guga was proposed by the French to play for Europe. In Grenoble, U Cluj beat the French, winning with 3-0, with Guga scoring twice.
After he graduated college in 1925, the press wrote that "the excellent international Romanian player will settle in Timişoara, very likely signing with one of the local teams." However, there are no official documents to confirm that he actually played for Timişoara. Instead, in November, he started playing for Gloria CFR Arad, helping his team finishing second in the Regional Championship. Sometime in March 1926, he joined UCAS Petroşani, the vice-champion team at the time, but retired from all the competitions that season. From 1927 he had a two-year spell in Lupeni, playing for local Jiul, and in 1929, he returned in Cluj, to play for the last time for the club that made him famous. In 1930, he was officially retired.
On 8 November 1936, Gazeta Sporturilor
reported that the day before, Guga was involved in a car accident. He lost control of his car, fell into the Bega Channel, and drowned.
As Ioan Chirilă recalls in his book:
Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
n football
Football (soccer)
Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a sport played between two teams of eleven players with a spherical ball...
player. Regarded as one of the most talented and versatile players of the early 1920s, Guga was the first captain of the Romania football team
Romania national football team
The Romania national football team is the national football team of Romania and is controlled by the Romanian Football Federation.Romania is one of only four national teams, the other three being Brazil, France, and Belgium, that took part in the first three World Cups.However, after that...
.
Early life
Born in Cuvin, Caraş-SeverinCaras-Severin County
Caraș-Severin is a county of Romania, in the historical region of Banat and few villages in Transylvania, with the county seat at Reșița.-Demographics:The county is part of the Danube-Kris-Mureș-Tisza euroregion....
, on 10th August 1898 (despite some sources claim that he was born in 1900), Guga finished his highschool in Oraviţa, before moving to Lugoj. Because of World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
he could not start playing football until 1919, when he was 21. He started at the local club, Vulturii Lugoj, but stayed only one year because he wanted to apply for the Commercial Academy from Cluj.
Career
After his arrival in Cluj, he joined U ClujFC Universitatea Cluj
Fotbal Club Universitatea Cluj is a Romanian professional football club from Cluj-Napoca, founded in 1919 by Iuliu Hațieganu. The team plays in the country's top-flight league, Liga I...
, a club formed one year earlier by the "Sports Society of University Students". At the time, he only played with his team in local competitions since there was not any football championship at a national level. In January 1922, a Viennese newspaper dedicated a full-page article to him, calling him "an exceptional forward player".
Sometime in October or November 1923, U Cluj got to play its first tournament abroad, at the invitation of the Grenoble
Grenoble
Grenoble is a city in southeastern France, at the foot of the French Alps where the river Drac joins the Isère. Located in the Rhône-Alpes region, Grenoble is the capital of the department of Isère...
municipality for the opening of their new stadium. U Cluj first played in Lyon, with a local team, managing to win with 5-2; Aurel Guga scored three times. The next day, the French press wrote that "he is a world-class player". Since there were rumors at the times about a friendly between the England national team
England national football team
The England national football team represents England in association football and is controlled by the Football Association, the governing body for football in England. England is the joint oldest national football team in the world, alongside Scotland, whom they played in the world's first...
and a team of selected players from the continent, Guga was proposed by the French to play for Europe. In Grenoble, U Cluj beat the French, winning with 3-0, with Guga scoring twice.
After he graduated college in 1925, the press wrote that "the excellent international Romanian player will settle in Timişoara, very likely signing with one of the local teams." However, there are no official documents to confirm that he actually played for Timişoara. Instead, in November, he started playing for Gloria CFR Arad, helping his team finishing second in the Regional Championship. Sometime in March 1926, he joined UCAS Petroşani, the vice-champion team at the time, but retired from all the competitions that season. From 1927 he had a two-year spell in Lupeni, playing for local Jiul, and in 1929, he returned in Cluj, to play for the last time for the club that made him famous. In 1930, he was officially retired.
On 8 November 1936, Gazeta Sporturilor
Gazeta Sporturilor
Gazeta Sporturilor is a daily newspaper in Romania, and the country's largest and most read sports-related publication...
reported that the day before, Guga was involved in a car accident. He lost control of his car, fell into the Bega Channel, and drowned.
As Ioan Chirilă recalls in his book:
Guga was one of the finest players this land ever gave, our land. And maybe the most complete. And the most modern.
International career
Aurel Guga captained the first official match of the Romania national team, against Yugoslavia, a match won by the Romanian team with Guga scoring the winning goal. He played six years for Romania, managing twelve caps and six goals. He also captained nine out of twelve matches.-
- Scores and results table. Romania's goal tally first:
International appearances and goals App Date Venue Opponent Result Goal Competition 1. 8 August 1922 Beograd BelgradeBelgrade is the capital and largest city of Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers, where the Pannonian Plain meets the Balkans. According to official results of Census 2011, the city has a population of 1,639,121. It is one of the 15 largest cities in Europe...
, YugoslaviaYugoslaviaYugoslavia refers to three political entities that existed successively on the western part of the Balkans during most of the 20th century....
2–1 1 Friendly Exhibition gameAn exhibition game is a sporting event in which there is no competitive value of any significant kind to any competitor regardless of the outcome of the competition...2. 3 September 1922 Cernăuti ChernivtsiChernivtsi is the administrative center of Chernivtsi Oblast in southwestern Ukraine. The city is situated on the upper course of the River Prut, a tributary of the Danube, in the northern part of the historic region of Bukovina, which is currently divided between Romania and Ukraine...
, RomaniaRomaniaRomania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
1–1 0 Friendly Exhibition gameAn exhibition game is a sporting event in which there is no competitive value of any significant kind to any competitor regardless of the outcome of the competition...3. 1 July 1923 Cluj Cluj-NapocaCluj-Napoca , commonly known as Cluj, is the fourth most populous city in Romania and the seat of Cluj County in the northwestern part of the country. Geographically, it is roughly equidistant from Bucharest , Budapest and Belgrade...
, RomaniaRomaniaRomania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
0–6 0 Friendly Exhibition gameAn exhibition game is a sporting event in which there is no competitive value of any significant kind to any competitor regardless of the outcome of the competition...4. 2 September 1923 Lviv LvivLviv is a city in western Ukraine. The city is regarded as one of the main cultural centres of today's Ukraine and historically has also been a major Polish and Jewish cultural center, as Poles and Jews were the two main ethnicities of the city until the outbreak of World War II and the following...
, PolandPolandPoland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
1–1 1 Friendly Exhibition gameAn exhibition game is a sporting event in which there is no competitive value of any significant kind to any competitor regardless of the outcome of the competition...5. 20 May 1924 Wien ViennaVienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
, AustriaAustriaAustria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
1–4 0 Friendly Exhibition gameAn exhibition game is a sporting event in which there is no competitive value of any significant kind to any competitor regardless of the outcome of the competition...6. 27 May 1924 Paris ParisParis is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, FranceFranceThe French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
0–6 0 1924 Summer Olympics Football at the 1924 Summer OlympicsAt the 1924 Summer Olympics held in Paris, Uruguay dominated the Football tournament winning the Gold.-Amateur Status:In 1921, the Belgium Football Association first allowed for payments to players for time lost from work; in the months that followed four other Associations permitted similar...7. 31 May 1925 Sofia SofiaSofia is the capital and largest city of Bulgaria and the 12th largest city in the European Union with a population of 1.27 million people. It is located in western Bulgaria, at the foot of Mount Vitosha and approximately at the centre of the Balkan Peninsula.Prehistoric settlements were excavated...
, BulgariaBulgariaBulgaria , officially the Republic of Bulgaria , is a parliamentary democracy within a unitary constitutional republic in Southeast Europe. The country borders Romania to the north, Serbia and Macedonia to the west, Greece and Turkey to the south, as well as the Black Sea to the east...
4–2 0 Friendly Exhibition gameAn exhibition game is a sporting event in which there is no competitive value of any significant kind to any competitor regardless of the outcome of the competition...8. 25 April 1926 Bucharest BucharestBucharest is the capital municipality, cultural, industrial, and financial centre of Romania. It is the largest city in Romania, located in the southeast of the country, at , and lies on the banks of the Dâmbovița River....
, RomaniaRomaniaRomania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
6–1 1 Friendly Exhibition gameAn exhibition game is a sporting event in which there is no competitive value of any significant kind to any competitor regardless of the outcome of the competition...9. 3 October 1926 Zagreb ZagrebZagreb is the capital and the largest city of the Republic of Croatia. It is in the northwest of the country, along the Sava river, at the southern slopes of the Medvednica mountain. Zagreb lies at an elevation of approximately above sea level. According to the last official census, Zagreb's city...
, YugoslaviaYugoslaviaYugoslavia refers to three political entities that existed successively on the western part of the Balkans during most of the 20th century....
3–2 1 King Alexandru's Cup 10. 10 May 1927 Bucharest BucharestBucharest is the capital municipality, cultural, industrial, and financial centre of Romania. It is the largest city in Romania, located in the southeast of the country, at , and lies on the banks of the Dâmbovița River....
, RomaniaRomaniaRomania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
0–3 0 King Alexandru's Cup 11. 19 June 1927 Bucharest BucharestBucharest is the capital municipality, cultural, industrial, and financial centre of Romania. It is the largest city in Romania, located in the southeast of the country, at , and lies on the banks of the Dâmbovița River....
, RomaniaRomaniaRomania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
3–3 0 Friendly Exhibition gameAn exhibition game is a sporting event in which there is no competitive value of any significant kind to any competitor regardless of the outcome of the competition...12. 15 April 1928 Arad Arad, RomaniaArad is the capital city of Arad County, in western Romania, in the Crişana region, on the river Mureş.An important industrial center and transportation hub, Arad is also the seat of a Romanian Orthodox archbishop and features two universities, a Romanian Orthodox theological seminary, a training...
, RomaniaRomaniaRomania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
4–2 0 Friendly Exhibition gameAn exhibition game is a sporting event in which there is no competitive value of any significant kind to any competitor regardless of the outcome of the competition...
- Scores and results table. Romania's goal tally first: