Valentin Stănescu also known as "Tinel" or "Zimbrul" (The bison) was born on 20 November 1922 in Bucharest and started playing junior level football at age 11 in 1933 at local club Olimpia.

[1][3][6][8][9] He made his Divizia A debut playing for Carmen București under coach Petre Steinbach on 16 March 1947 in a 3–2 away victory against Dermagarand Târgu Mureș.

[1][3][6][8][10] At the end of the season, the Carmen team was dissolved by the Communist regime that just took over the country, so he and teammate Bazil Marian wanted to flee to Italy, going on a ship from the Port of Constanța but were caught by the authorities who told them that they can choose from either going to jail or play for a working-class team such as Locomotiva București and both of them chose the latter.

[1] Valentin Stănescu played 5 matches at international level for Romania, making his debut on 22 June 1947 when coach Colea Vâlcov introduced him in the 71st minute in order to replace Stanislau Konrad in a 3–1 loss against Yugoslavia at the 1947 Balkan Cup in which he did not concede any goals.

[3][15][16] His following game, a 3–2 victory against Bulgaria was also at the 1947 Balkan Cup, a competition in which he also made his last appearance for the national team on 12 October 1947 in a 3–0 loss against Hungary.

[15] Valentin Stănescu started his managerial career in 1953 at Locomotiva MCF București in the Romanian regional championship.

[1][3][4][5][6][7][8][17] In the following season he led Rapid in the 1967–68 European Cup, making his first European performance by eliminating Trakia Plovdiv with 3–2 on aggregate, being eliminated in the following round by Juventus Torino with 1–0 on aggregate, also he reached the 1968 Cupa României Final which was lost with 3–1 in extra time in front of Dinamo București that was coached by his former Carmen București teammate, Bazil Marian.

[1][3][4][5][6][7][8] Valentin Stănescu was the first coach that won the Romanian top-division, Divizia A with three different teams, having a total of 455 matches as a manager in the competition, consisting of 206 victories, 101 draws and 148 losses.