Claudiu Iulian Niculescu (born 23 June 1976) is a Romanian football coach and former striker, currently in charge of Liga II club CSM Slatina.

[1][2][5] Niculescu made his Divizia A debut on 1 March 1998, playing for Universitatea Craiova under Spanish coach José Ramón Alexanko in a 2–1 victory against Petrolul Ploiești in which he scored one goal.

[2][6][7][8][9][10] In 2001 he went to play for Dinamo București where in his first season he won the Divizia A title, being the second top-goalscorer of the league with 15 goals, as coaches Cornel Dinu and Marin Ion gave him 28 appearances.

[2][11][12] In 2002, shortly after scoring a spectacular goal from about 30 meters against goalkeeper Iker Casillas in a friendly which ended with a 5–2 loss against Real Madrid, Niculescu was transferred to Genoa in Serie B for a fee estimated by the Romanian press between €700.000 and €1 million.

[2][5][13] He spent only one year with The Griffin, being teammate with compatriots Adrian Mihalcea and Paul Codrea, making only 13 appearances in which he scored three goals as his stay there was affected by injuries, returning to Dinamo who agreed to pay the Genovese team €800.000 to get him back.

[2][12][6][19] With eight goals scored in the 2006–07 UEFA Cup, of which four were in the group stage against Beşiktaş, Club Brugge and a double in the 2–1 victory in front of Bayer Leverkusen for which he received a 10 in the Gazeta Sporturilor newspaper, Niculescu was the second best goal-scorer of the competition, having three less than Espanyol's Walter Pandiani, helping The Red Dogs reach the sixteenths-finals where they were eliminated by Benfica.

[20] In the following season, Dinamo had the objective of reaching the Champions League group stage, Niculescu playing in both legs of the third qualifying round against Lazio Roma, which however was lost with 4–2 on aggregate.

[2][6][7][8] Claudiu Niculescu played 8 games at international level for Romania, making his debut when coach László Bölöni sent him on the field in order to replace Marius Niculae in the 81st minute of a friendly which ended with a 2–1 victory against FR Yugoslavia.