Tudor Baluta nets as Romania Under 21s start with a win
Brighton and Hove Albion midfielder Tudor Baluta helped Romania Under 21s get off to the perfect start at the European Championships as they hammered Croatia 4-1 in their opening game.
Don’t worry if you’ve never heard of Baluta. Or you think you’ve heard of him but don’t know why. He was one of the many players that the Albion forked out money for in January but who are yet to set foot inside the Amex.
He cost £2.5m from FC Viitorul Constanta and is considered one of the leading lights of what looks to be a talented generation of Romanian’s coming through.
Like Baluta, many of them are Viitorul players. The club was formed in 2009 by Romanian legend Gheorgie Hagi with the purpose of giving young players an opportunity for first team football.
It’s turned out to be a roaring success and Viitorul have risen through the divisions under both Hagi’s chairmanship and management.
They claimed the 2016-17 season Romanian title and recently added the Romanian Cup to their honours list, beating Astra Giurgiu in the final in May.
That Baluta is playing in the tournament in Italy is something of a surprise. He’s become a regular feature of Romania’s senior squad over the last year or so despite being just 19 years old.
Clearly, he is a player of some potential. And so are his teammates, a fact that was hammered home by this impressive result against a nation whose senior squad reached the World Cup Final last summer in Russia.
A VAR awarded penalty was converted by George Puscas after just 11 minutes. Three minutes later and Ianis Hagi – son of Gheorgie – made it 2-0 after capitalising on a defensive mistake.
The blistering start continued as Croatia pulled one back within another four minutes through Nikola Vlasic. That was the end of the scoring until just past the hour mark when Baluta picked up a sloppy Croatian pass on the edge of the box, danced past a covering defender and then fired the ball low and hard into the bottom corner.
Romania’s fourth came in injury time with another effort from inside the six yard box, this time from Adrian Petre. The result leaves Romania top of Group C although there are tougher examinations to come against England on Friday and France on Monday.
That will give us more of an opportunity on which to judge Baluta. As an EU Citizen, he could be part of Graham Potter’s first team squad next season without having the work permit issues which have prevented the likes of Percy Tau and Alexis Mac Allister from becoming fully fledged Brighton players.
Brighton’s other representative at the tournament is Danish winger Anders Dreyer. He was an unused substitute in Denmark’s opening group game on Monday, a 3-1 defeat to Germany. Dreyer and company are next in action on Thursday against Austria.
You can read more about Baluta in our interview with Romanian football journalist Alexandru Avram.
