Anghel Iordanescu waited 22 years for this. In a pre-match news conference that became somewhat tetchy, it felt as if the veteran Romania coach might have counted every one of those days.
The 1994 World Cup in the United States is a tournament remembered fondly by Romanian football fans, as a vintage line-up inspired by the mercurial Gheorghe Hagi dazzled en route to quarter-final penalty shoot-out heartbreak versus Sweden.
Iordanescu was the man at the helm, in the first of three spells as Romania boss, but there was one blot on their exploits in the USA – a 4-1 loss to Switzerland, then led by Roy Hodgson.
"Are you from Switzerland?" he smiled wearily when asked for his recollections on their painful day at the Pontiac Silverdome.
"We were a bit stressed on the pitch and we lost that game, but we had a lot of positive emotions afterwards."
There were four changes in Iordanescu's starting XI, with Alibec again waiting in the wings as Claudiu Keseru came in for Florin Andone as the attacking spearhead. But it was another omission that showed how reality for this 66-year-old tactician has changed and dulled with time.
It is an unfairly weighty comparison for the fledgling Steaua Bucharest playmaker, but Nicolae Stanciu is the present day Romania's closest approximation to Hagi – all silken touches and bright ideas against France.
Talk of pre-match unease appeared to leak on to the field as they coughed up two clear chances for Haris Seferovic. Switzerland's first choice striker could not take them and this is a status upon which his grip is loosening.
The Eintracht Frankfurt man might be 42 years Iordanescu's junior but when he made way to the rapturously received teen sensation Breel Embolo during the second period he will have felt football's sometimes cruel fates ageing him by the second.
He managed to score a penalty at the national stadium and did likewise here - Stephan Lichsteiner's low point of a maddening afternoon against Alexandru Chipciu coming when he grasped a handful of the left-flank irritant's shirt inside the box and directly in front of the referee.
Chipciu and Gabriel Torje represented fresh legs on either wing and this was necessary within Iordanescu's game plan, as each paid unwaveringly close attention to the rampaging capabilities of Lichsteiner and Ricardo Rodriguez from full-back.
They were at least able to join hands and wearily accept "oles" from their travelling fans at full-time. Four points might well be enough to progress under UEFA's expanded 24-team format.
