Background
He was born in 1916 during the First World War, in the Transylvanian town of Zlatna, back then within Austro-Hungary, nowadays in Romania.
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Virgil Popescu
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He began playing for Novi Sad club FK and was part of "s so called Millionaires team at the beginning of the 1940s. He played with in the Novi Sad subassociation league in the 1938-1939 season and then in the Serbian League between 1939 and 1941. The Second World War started in Yugoslavia in 1941.
lieutenant took four days, on 10 April, when he was captured by Axis forces near Belgrade and taken to Romania to a concentration camp in Turnu Măgurele.
After spending two years in the camp, in 1943 he caught the attention of Juventus Bucharest boss Cezar Popescu who got the news that this 27-year-old defender who had played in Serbia was in the camp 8. By explaining how Virgil Popescu was a Romanian and as such a German ally, he managed to release him from the camp and brought him to the team
He made his debut for Bucharest side Juventus on 6 October, in match against Craiova. He made 7 appearances for Juventus in the 1943-1944 Romanian Divizia A. However, not very long afterwards he entered in the club offices and said that he had to leave to fight along Yugoslav Partisans and Marshal Tito in freeing Yugoslavia, and club officials accepted his will, so he returned to Yugoslavia and joined the resistance.
He fought the Germans, and at the end of the war, in 1945, he was among the founders of Belgrade-based FK which will become one of the major powers of Yugoslav football.
His passion for Serbia was such that he adopted a Serbian name, Stanislav. He played with in the Yugoslav First League for two seasons. He played a total of 65 matches and scored once for, of which 17 matches were in the league.
Earlier, he played with Systems, Applications and Products in the 1945 Yugoslav Football Tournament.
He later became a coach. He coached Miroslav Blažević at NK Rijeka in the Yugoslav First League and he was the assistant manager of Abdulah Gegić at when they reached the 1966 European Cup Final.
He also coached Polish side in the season 1964-1965. Popescu then managed Swiss team Saint Gallen and Wormatia Worms in Germany before moving to Morocco and Algeria to help develop football in those countries, there he coached the Moroccan Olympic side and KAC Kénitra.
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Popescu was at the time attending the Commercial Academy in Belgrade, and by 6 April 1941, he was a second lieutenant defending the country against German forces.
