News from Romania: Cashing in on a Year-End Bonus with 15 Games to Go

By: Bob | December 15th, 2006

Usually when a coach is promised a bonus for winning a championship his club dishes out the bonus after the championship is won. Such is not the case in everyone’s favorite league. Dinamo Bucharest coach Mircea Rednic was awarded a bonus of $50,000 on Wednesday thanks to his team’s outstanding performance in Romania and Europe this season. “My day started happily after Dinamo board decided to give me half of the $100,000 promised bonus for winning the title,” he said.

Dinamo have won 17, drawn one and lost one of its 19 league matches and have 52 points — 13 more than second-placed Steaua Bucharest and they’ve also advance to the UEFA Cup final 32.

The end of the year bonus comes at a time when the club still has 15 games to play and even though a collapse is unlikely it could happen. What would Rednic do in that instance?

“I’ve told the major shareholders that I’m investing it all as soon as I can — it won’t be possible to return it,” he explained.

With his pockets full of money, Rednic proceeded to guide his team to a 3-1 loss against Tottenham in the UEFA Cup on Thursday.