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Romania play host to the USA on Saturday. The match will begin Romania’s warm-ups ahead of the World Cup. The USA missed out on qualifying but will be very busy in facing European teams this month. The first stop for the Eagles is Bucharest; a hunting ground in which the USA have won three of their past four meetings against Romania.
Romania also play three matches. The Eagles will be the only home game for the Stejarii. After facing the USA, Romania take-on Georgia in Tbilisi and Italy in San Benedetto del Tronto. In short, Romania vs USA is Romania’s home farewell before the World Cup.
Head Coach Eugen Apjok has named a team combing proven experience and fresh opportunities. Test. Mihai Macovei, who surpassed 100 test caps against Samoa in 2022, will lead the side from the flanker in his 104th test match.
Macovei debuted for Romania against neighboring Ukraine in 2006. He did so eight days before Alun Wyn Jones debuted for Wales. The former Welsh captain is the most capped player in test rugby history with 158 caps for Wales and 12 for the British & Irish Lions.
The Stejarii captain missed Rugby World Cup 2007 but appeared in the 2011 and 2015 tournaments. He has an impressive Americas footprint. Macovei is the world record holder for test matches against different Americas opponents. He has caps against Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Uruguay and USA.
Macovei will be joined by Cristi Boboc and Cristi Chirică in the back-row. Marius Iftimiciuc and Andrei Mahu form a French-based second-row. Mahu has 24 test caps for his native Moldova. He follows teammate, Gheorghe Gajion in changing allegiance to switch test countries from Moldova to Romania.
Gajion will start at tight head against the USA. Alexandru Savin and Ovidiu Cojocaru join him up front. Meanwhile, Mahu is one of three players making their test debuts for Romania. The others are Sikuea Taliauli and Manumua Tevita.
Sikuea Taliauli has also changed allegiance. He previously played for Tonga. Another former Tonga 7’s player, Sione Faka’osilea, resulted in Romania’s disqualification from Rugby World Cup 2019. Sione Faka’osilea’s test career ended. However, in addition to Taliauli a second Tongan will debut on Saturday. Manumua Tevita and Taliauli both start in the backs.
Taliuli will play left wing and Tevita inside center. They are part of what is highly different to Romania’s historically traditional line-ups. On the one hand, every player on Romania’s roster at RWC 2011 was from Romania. On the other hand, the backline to face the USA fas few homegrown players.
Scrum-half Alin Conache comes from a well-known Romanian rugby family and right winger Marius Simionescu is also homegrown. Fly half Gabriel Pop moved to Portugal as a child. The four others are Taliuli and Tevita from Tonga and center Jason Tomane and fullback Hinckley Vaovasa from New Zealand.
Romania will compete in Pool B of Rugby World Cup 2023. The Stejarii are in arguably the toughest group. It contains Ireland, Scotland, Tonga and world champions South Africa. Romania begin their campaign against Ireland on September 09 in Bordeaux.
The test match marks the USA Eagles’ return to the arena for the first time since missing out on qualifying for the World Cup. Gary Gold has been replaced by Scott Lawrence. In his first match in charge, Lawrence has named a side with six returnees from the Eagles’ 2018 win in Bucharest.
Cam Dolan, Dylan Fawsitt, Greg Peterson, Ruben de Haas, Paul Mullen and Joe Taufete’e all won that day. Dolan is now the most active USA player with 63 caps and is the third most capped Eagle of all-time behind Todd Clever (76 caps) and Mike MacDonald (67 caps).
The New Orleans Gold captain has played across the back-row and in the second-row. It is in the second-row where he will join captain Greg Peterson. The skipper will earn his 40th cap behind a front-row of Jack Iscaro, Dylan Fawsitt, and Paul Mullen.
While there are experienced names in the line-up there are even more newcomers. The team is very much the start of something new. Five uncapped players will start for the Eagles and four more are to make their debuts as replacements.
The back-row of Sam Godda, Paddy Ryan, and Luke White is entirely uncapped. Godda is a native of Denver, White is from Sydney, Australia while Ryan was born in Chicago but raised in Ireland.
Scrum-half Nick McCarthy will also debut and is also connected to Ireland. McCarthy was born in Michigan but learned his rugby in Ireland. Outside him is Luke Carry who is from Ireland. Outside center Mika Kruse will earn his 6th cap. The Californian will do so inside Tommaso Boni who makes the allegiance change from Italy. He earned 11 caps for the Azzurri from 2016-2018.
It is an all-MLR back-three with Californian Christian Dyer joining Minnesotan Nate Augspurger and Australian Mitch Wilson. Another Australian can debut with Jake Turnbull from the replacements. The additional uncapped replacements are Utah native Takaji Young Yen, Chris Mattina from New York and Thomas Tu’avao who is from England but attended Lincoln High School in Stockton, California.
There have been eight test matches between Romania and the USA. The first was played at the 1924 Paris Olympics. The USA won 37-0 en route to winning Gold. The most recent match was in 2018. The Eagles were convincing 31-5 winners in Bucharest.
Matches between Romania and the USA are contested for the Pershing Cup. The trophy is in memory of General John Joseph Pershing, who organized the Military Olympics, the “Inter-Allied Games”, in 1919. As part of the competition the USA military were 21-0 winners.
ROMANIA
1 Alexandru Savin, 2 Ovidiu Cojocaru, 3 Gheorghe Gajion, 4 Marius Iftimiciuc, 5. Andrei Mahu, 6. Mihai Macovei (capt.), 7 Cristi Boboc, 8 Cristi Chirică, 9. Alin Conache, 10 Gabriel Pop, 11 Sikuea Taliuli, 12 Manumua Tevita, 13 Jason Tomane, 14 Marius Simionescu, 15 Hinckley Vaovasa
Replacements: 16 Florin Bărdașu, 17 Iulian Hartig, 18 Alexandru Gordaș, 19 Ștefan Iancu, 20 Vlad Neculau, 21 Florin Surugiu, 22 Mihai Mureșan, 23 Ionel Melinte
USA
1 Jack Iscaro, 2 Dylan Fawsitt, 3 Paul Mullen, 4 Cam Dolan, 5 Greg Peterson (capt.), 6 Sam Golla, 7 Paddy Ryan, 8 Luke White, 9 Nick McCarthy, 10 Luke Carty, 11 Nate Augspurger, 12 Tommaso Boni, 13 Mika Kruse, 14 Christian Dyer, 15 Mitch Wilson
Replacements: 16 Joe Taufete’e, 17 Jake Turnbull, 18 Takaji Young Yen, 19 Nate Brakeley, 20 Thomas Tu’avao, 21 Ruben de Haas, 22 Chris Mattina, 23 Tavite Lopeti
RUGBY WORLD CUP WARM-UP
Date: Saturday August 05
Kick-Off: 8:00pm (RO); 1:00pm (Eastern)
Venue: Stadionul National Arcul de Triumf, Bucharest (RO)
Referee: Sam Grove-White (UK)
Assistant Referees: Anthony Woodthorpe (UK); Hollie Davidson (UK)
TMO: Matteo Liperini (IT)
vs
COMPLETE RESULTS
Nov 17, 2018 – Romania 05-31 USA (Bucharest, RO)
Nov 13, 2016 – Romania 23-10 USA (Bucharest, RO)
Nov 08, 2014 – Romania 17-27 USA (Bucharest, RO)
Nov 26, 2012 – Romania 03-34 USA (Bucharest, RO)
May 29, 2005 – USA 28-22 Romania (Tokyo, JP)
Oct 09, 1999 – Romania 27-25 USA (Dublin, IE)
Sep 17, 1988 – USA 17-07 Romania (Moscow, USSR)
May 11, 1924 – USA 37-0 Romania (Paris, FR)
Romania Wins: 2
USA Wins: 6
