side FC Gloria Buzău. He had been initially employed as Technical Director, and developed young players such as Eric Bicfalvi, Alexandru Tudose, and Alin Litu, all of whom became members of the Romania national under-21 football team. He took over the Head Coach role in late 2008, and helped turn around a club that had made the worst ever start to a season in the Romanian League. He secured a notable draw, away to traditional powerhouse Steaua București. In June 2009, he was appointed Manager of South Africa National First Division side Black Leopards. Fans heralded Marinica as 'the messiah' upon his appointment, but after just over a month in the hotseat he had to return to Bucharest due to family problems. Former South Africa national team and then Mamelodi Sundowns coach Ted Dumitru commented at the time; "Mario is a very tactical coach and I'm convinced that he would have turned the team around. He has very strong scientific aspects of hard performance in football." In July 2010 he was employed as Technical Director at Romanian Premier League side Sportul Studenţesc, following speculation linking him with the Zambia national football team job. Marinica then took on a role as assistant manager of Hungarian premier league club Kaposvári Rákóczi FC, he then left the position to take on a similar role with Romanian giants Rapid București. In December 2014, he was linked with the vacant manager's job at English Conference National side AFC Telford United. Marinica left his advisory technical role at Rapid București in March 2015, he released a short statement saying " it was a pleasure to work at one of the greatest names in Romanian football, unfortunately financial constraints at the club have forced me to leave from my role , I wish the club the fans and the owners all the best at helping to return this magnificent football club where they belong". June 2015 saw Marinica take up the Director of Football role alongside Stewart Hall as Azam F.C. made a major overhaul of their technical staff with an eye on a successful campaign on the Confederation of Africa Federations (CAF) competition. Marinica was able to help alongside Stewart Hall in leading the club to securing their first Kegame Interclub cup title without conceding a single goal, the trophy is contested among the best teams in central and eastern Africa. September 2016 saw him take