Petre Steinbach was born on 1 January 1906 in Temesvár, Austria-Hungary, being of Banat Swabian ethnicity, starting to play football in 1925 at CAM Timișoara.

[2][3][4] Petre Steinbach was selected by coach Constantin Rădulescu to be part of Romania's squad at the first World Cup, the 1930 edition in which however he did not play.

[4][5][11][12] He started coaching in 1934 while also being an active player at Unirea Tricolor București, during his three-seasons spell the biggest performance being the reaching of the 1936 Cupa României final which was lost with 5–1 loss in front of Ripensia Timișoara.

[3][11][12] His biggest junior level performance was reaching the 1960 European Under-18 Championship final with Romania's under-18 team which was lost with 2–1 in front of Hungary.

[22] Steinbach was also a writer, he wrote his first book in 1937 called Fotbalul nostru (Our football) which received a positive review from Camil Petrescu.

[3][4][5][11][12] He wrote another volume called Fotbalul se joacă râzând (Football is played with laughter), released in 1972, also for a few years he would write an analysis column in the Sportul popular newspaper.