Losing Innocence

Were the teams of Sao Toma and Prinicip to miraculously qualify for the World Soccer Cup and were they to meet Yugoslavia (which we believe will certainly be participating), it would be a match before which journalists and bookies would have nothing to do. Played — 0, Won — 0, Tied — 0, Lost — 0, Goal Difference 0:0. The case is very similar these days as we await July 23 and the first match between the Belgrade Partizan and the Zagreb Croatia in the preliminary qualifying round of the Champions League. These two teams are meeting for the first time, which also happens to be the first official soccer match between teams of the Republic of Croatia and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, and the first time that a Croatian team is visiting Belgrade (the opposite will happen in Zagreb on July 30, also for the first time) after the civil/liberation/non-participation war on the territories of the former shared state.

Of course, as soon as the news of the UEFA lots drawing was made public, as the poet Djordje Balasevic puts it, "we found each other in past lives" and found at the same time a collection of facts, anecdotes and cards, which all together could also amount to one imposing "zero:zero". Of what value is the fact that in 90 matches between former Partizan and former (and its fans hope, the future) Dinamo, Belgrade was more successful (39 wins, 14 draws, and 32 losses). What psychological advantage could the disciples of Ljubisa Tumbakovic draw from the fact that their predecessors left Maksimir as victors, while all previous generations of the Zagreb "maroons" barely strung together three wins on the Stadium of JNA, at a time when most of them never saw Zagreb except on a postcard.

INVESTMENTS: On what scale should we measure Dinamo’s four titles of champion and all together seven wins of "the favorite trophy of our soccer league" (the Marshall Tito trophy for the victory in the Cup), against the nine champion, and five Cup titles of the "black-and-whites". Is the win of the Cup of Exhibition Cities (qualifying for UEFA) in 1967, or the final of the Cup of European Champions in 1966 more important?

Against that, there are some other statistics. Croatia (that is the present name of Dinamo) has invested a lot of money in its present team. It has paid 3.2 million DEM’s to get Robert Procinec, who, it is worth noting, Ciro Blazevic sent packing from Maksimir ten year ago, deeming him an untalented player without prospects. Partizan has not spent that much money on all its players in the past five years.

Regardless of the differences in investment, this will be a clash of two state projects. One, to appease the wishes of President Tudjman (once a forward with FK Partizan) at all costs, and the other, to appease the part public, part private "lobby" around the President of the Serbian Government which, under the slogan of "the champion’s sponsor" withdraws hundred thousand DEM’s for Partizan every month from the safes of the few remaining solvent companies in Serbia.

Everything that was formerly achieved through selection, youth training, a strong domestic league and regular participation in European competitions, in Belgrade just as in Zagreb, is now being attempted over night in the hoped for victory in the two upcoming matches.

TACTICS: In that sense, accepting the hypothesis that this is in many ways "for the first time", Belgrade wiseguys are calling the upcoming matches a "losing of innocence", after which - it is supposed- we will "enter the soccer mainstream" when such matches will not require special preparations of the organizers and the spectators. As we are speaking about spectators, from sources close to Cegi and buddies (the leading fans of Partizan) we are learning that a special surprise is being prepared for the players of Croatia and the Croatian disciples who will "follow the coverage of the developing story on small screens" in Belgrade: it will consist of complete silence, staring, and ignoring for as long as possible.

That would also be a first time, because that which many expect (chaotic whistling with shouts of "Ustashe, Ustash") has already happened many times, especially in the last years before the breakup of our shared SFRY. Even in the sixties, when the Zagreb team insisted on Italian referees in Belgrade, to the astonishment of the guardians of "brotherhood and unity", both the team and the referees were greeted in the Stadium of JNA with shouts of "Ustashe, Ustashe".