SERBIA

Nenad Lj. Srefanovic, AIM Belgrade

This year's basketball play-off for the title of the champion of FR Yugoslavia between Buducnost from Montenegro and Partizan from Serbia basketball teams can be observed as a paradigm of the current situation in Yugoslav sports in general - a small audience, poor quality, a lot of police inside and members of special units outside the hall where the game was played, biased media... All this is, of course, just an echo of what is happening for years on the political scene between Belgrade and Podgorica.

However, the presence of politics at sports stadiums in FR Yugoslavia could best be illustrated by the story about the known criminal Zeljko Raznjatovic Arkan who several years before his death realised that for the first time in his life he could make enormous amounts of money through football. He bought the small Obilic football club with which he soon won the championship of FRY, while rumours were heard that out of fear of Arkan the referees gave penalties to this team too often, so that it all of a sudden triumphed over the big teams such as Zvezda and Partizan. In the meantime Arkan was awarded the diploma of a football coach; he graduated with a study titled "Preparations of Players for Games".

For the regime of Slobodan Milosevic (who personally not once visited a sports event), sports were an exceptionally important part of the global state and national project. Through the most prominent officials of the ruling party all sports unions and associations were strictly controlled. In the conditions of the lack of money and the sanctions money was provided for big competitions, and full control of the sports was established, since the opposition was carefully kept away unable to exert any influence on them.

For the time being, it is hard to speak competently about the attitude of the new authorities towards sports. In the meantime, it seems that the crisis which is shaking Yugoslav sports is affecting football the most. Statistics shows that on the average two football players are leaving the country every day...