Mircea Dridea (born 7 April 1937) is a Romanian former professional football player and manager, who is the current honorary president of Liga I club Petrolul Ploiești.
Dridea made his last Divizia A appearance on 20 June 1971 in Petrolul's 1–1 draw against CFR Timișoara, totaling 273 matches with 142 goals in the competition.[3][7][13]
International career
Dridea played 15 games and scored eight goals for Romania, making his debut under coach Augustin Botescu on 30 August 1959 in a friendly that ended with a 3–2 away win over Poland in which he scored a hat-trick.[1][14]
Dridea started his career as coach at a junior squad of Petrolul Ploiești, winning the 1972–73 national junior title.[7] He started the 1973–74 Divizia A season as an assistant of Gheorghe Dumitrescu for Petrolul's senior team, but after finishing the first half of the season in 16th place, Dumitrescu left the club.[3][7] Thus, Dridea became the head coach of the team for the second half, but could not save the team from relegation to Divizia B.[3][7] He then coached Petrolul Teleajen in Divizia C for almost two years, being close to a promotion to Divizia B.[7] He returned to Petrolul to lead them in the 1981–82 Divizia B season, helping the club achieve promotion to Divizia A.[7] In the winter of 1982 the Moroccan Football Federation asked the Romanian Football Federation to send them four coaches, and one of them was Dridea who went to FAR Rabat, leaving the club at 1983.[5][7] He came back to Romania, working at Divizia B club, Prahova Ploiești which he helped avoid relegation.[7] He returned for a third spell as coach at Petrolul, because Petre Dragomir left the team after the first six games of the 1985–86 Divizia A, leading them for two seasons.[3][7][15] Dridea went to coach for a second spell in Morocco at Kénitra, afterwards returning to Romania at Progresul Brăila.[3][5] He coached in the first half of the 1988–89 Divizia A season at Sportul Studențesc București, working in the second half at Oțelul Galați.[3][5][15] In the following years he coached in the Romanian lower leagues at Flacăra Moreni, Metalul Plopeni which he helped get promoted to Divizia B and Metalul Filipeștii de Pădure with whom he earned a promotion to Divizia C after winning a play-off against Foresta Nehoiu.[3][5][7] He also had a spell in Egypt at Olympic Alexandria and ended his coaching career in Tunisia at Olympique de Médenine in 1997.[3][5][7]
Dridea has a total of 121 matches as a manager in the Romanian top-division, Divizia A, consisting of 37 victories, 33 draws and 51 losses.[3][7][15] He also worked as Petrolul's president on three occasions.[3][7]
Dridea with his wife Mihaela and their daughter Dana in 1966
Style of play
Dridea described his style of play as:"I worked enormously to be very good at headers and free kicks. If we were to go by talent, I wouldn't be in the top 20 players in the history of Petrolul. But in terms of utility, I'm sure on the podium".[3]
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