THE BEGINNING OF THE END | A FAREWELL OF YUGOSLAVIA 30 YEARS AGO

It was the beginning of the end of a big country, at that time the great National Team as well, that participated for the last time in a big competition under the name – SFR Yugoslavia.

On this day, June 3^rd 1990, at its farewell of the Yugoslav public before leaving to Italy for the FIFA World Cup Italy 1990, the Yugoslav National Football team was defeated by Netherlands 0:2 (0:0). The match was played at “Maksimir” Stadium in Zagreb under big political tensions and only a few weeks after the famous non played match – Dinamo-Crvena zvezda, which was full of serious incidents.

The Head Coach, Ivica Osim selected the following players to face the current European Champions: Tomislav Ivković, Zoran Vulić, Mirsad Baljić, Predrag Spasić, Faruk Hadžibegić, Davor Jozić, Safet Sušić (from 59^th min.of play – Robert Prosinečki), Srećko Katanec (from 59. min.of play – Dragoljub Brnović), Dejan Savicević, Dragan Stojković, Zlatko Vujović (from 75^th . min.of play – Darko Pancev).

The crowd turned back when the National Anthem of Yugoslavia was played along with their whistles to the National Anthem. The stadium was full with “Dutch” flags, and the home fans whistled to their National Team throughout the match. The Yugoslav National Team played that game only for itself, since no one was supporting them. Before the match, Faruk Hadžibegić commented “it means 11 of us against 20000”. Dragan Stojković was also astonished by the events on the Stadium “Maksimir”…

“Leo Beenhakker stated at the Press Conference after the match, being as well astonished, that he had no idea that Netherlands has so many supporters in this part of Europe. Later, it was explained to him that they were not their fans, but our “non-fans”. Politics has already taken a big part, but there were no problems among players. We were functioning as a team and did not experience the slightest inconvenience during the preparations period in Croatia.”