Football player, goal keeper, member of national team.
He is one of the most important identities in the Romanian football’s heroic period of time, which was born in Temesvár (Timisoara).
He has eight more brothers, but he is the only one who plays football. He starts his career as a football player in 1919, at the Kinizsi junior football team. For a whole year, 1923, he is very successful in the team of the Spirits Factory as a goal keeper, then in 1924 he returns to the Kinizsi junior football team; from here, in 1926, he gets into the adult team of the violet and whites. He overtakes the function of the legendary famous goal keeper, Ritter Béla.
As an adult goalkeeper, his introduction is very successful since between 1926 and 1927 the Kinizsi football team obtains the sixth national Championship. Given his remarkable results, he catches the attention of Teofil Morariu, the captain of the Romanian national football players; consequently, he is also chosen to take part in the national team. He performs as a selected goalkeeper in October 3, 1926, in Zagreb, where the Romanian team obtains the victory against Yugoslavia 3-2 (1-0). At the ninth football match he plays as the goal keeper of the Romanian selected team. He plays for the last time in the nation’s eleven colours at the World Championship in 1934 in Italy, in the match against Czechoslovakia.
The matches against the Bilbao FC in 1926, or the match against Juventus Torino in 1928, when the Kinizsi football team had won (3-0), are still preserved in one’s memory. His team’s victorious career was also known abroad: eighty years ago, according to the results of some international opinion research organised by the English in November 28, 1929, the year’s six best European goalkeepers are the following ones, in the chronological order: Frantisek Planicka (Czechoslovakia), Ricardo Zamora (Spain), Gianpiero Conbi (Italy), Martin Hiden (Austria), Amsel Ignác (Hungary) and Zombory Vilmos (Romania).
The talented goalkeeper is accepted by Ripensia in 1929, and he represents its colours until 1938, excepting a whole year (1935-1936). As the goalkeeper of the Ripensia team, he wins two national championships (1932-1933 and 1934-1935) and a Romanian Cup Final (1933-1934). After he plays in the ILSA football team in 1938 and 1939, he interrupts his career for five years.
Between 1945 and 1947 he is the goalkeeper of the Polytechnical University in Timisoara. He is already 41 years old when he completes his activity as a sport player forever.
Zombory Vilmos is not only an exceptional goalkeeper but also a player responsible for the match sanctions (11 m sanction), therefore he is mentioned in the history of the Romanian football matches. When he meets his friends after his last football match, he funnily states, that during his career the number of the sanctions he had certified was higher than the number of goals he had missed. After he gives up playing football, he develops his experience as a trainer and umpire. As a trainer, between 1949 and 1951, he deals with the „Vulturii” football team from Lugoj, and as a coach, until 1957, he conducts the football matches belonging to the A and B categories.
He dies at the age of 87, on January 17, 1993.
