Bobek in 1949 | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Personal information | ||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Date of birth | (1923-12-03)3 December 1923 | |||||||||||||||||||
| Place of birth | Zagreb,Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes | |||||||||||||||||||
| Date of death | 22 August 2010(2010-08-22) (aged 86) | |||||||||||||||||||
| Place of death | Belgrade, Serbia | |||||||||||||||||||
| Position | Forward | |||||||||||||||||||
| Youth career | ||||||||||||||||||||
| 1936–1938 | HŠK Derbi | |||||||||||||||||||
| 1938–1942 | ŠK Zagreb | |||||||||||||||||||
| 1942–1944 | HŠK Ličanin | |||||||||||||||||||
| Senior career* | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Years | Team | Apps | (Gls) | |||||||||||||||||
| 1942 | Admira Wacker | 8 | (7) | |||||||||||||||||
| 1944–1945 | Građanski Zagreb | 15 | (13) | |||||||||||||||||
| 1945 | Yugoslav Army | 3 | (8) | |||||||||||||||||
| 1946–1959 | Partizan | 198 | (121) | |||||||||||||||||
| Total | 224 | (149) | ||||||||||||||||||
| International career | ||||||||||||||||||||
| 1943–1945 | Croatia U21 | |||||||||||||||||||
| 1946–1956 | Yugoslavia | 63 | (38) | |||||||||||||||||
| Managerial career | ||||||||||||||||||||
| 1959 | Legia Warsaw | |||||||||||||||||||
| 1960–1963 | Partizan | |||||||||||||||||||
| 1963–1967 | Panathinaikos | |||||||||||||||||||
| 1967–1969 | Partizan | |||||||||||||||||||
| 1969–1970 | Olympiacos | |||||||||||||||||||
| 1970 | Altay | |||||||||||||||||||
| 1970–1972 | Galenika Zemun | |||||||||||||||||||
| 1972 | Dinamo Zagreb | |||||||||||||||||||
| 1973–1974 | Galenika Zemun | |||||||||||||||||||
| 1974–1975 | Panathinaikos | |||||||||||||||||||
| 1975–1976 | Panetolikos | |||||||||||||||||||
| 1976–1978 | Espérance | |||||||||||||||||||
| 1978–1982 | Vardar | |||||||||||||||||||
Medal record
| ||||||||||||||||||||
| * Club domestic league appearances and goals | ||||||||||||||||||||
Stjepan Bobek (pronounced[stjêpaːnbǒbek]; 3 December 1923 – 22 August 2010) was a Yugoslav and Croatian professionalfootballstriker and laterfootball manager.[1]
Usually a forward or attacking midfielder, Bobek was renowned for his technique, vision and goalscoring ability and is commonly regarded as one of Yugoslavia's greatest players. He is remembered for his time at Belgrade'sPartizan, where he moved to following the end ofWorld War II. He played for Partizan between 1945 and 1959 helping them win twoYugoslav First League titles and fourYugoslav Cups, and was named the club's greatest player in history in 1995. Internationally, he is the second all-time top scorer for theYugoslavia national team, scoring 38 goals in 63 appearances between 1946 and 1956, and was member of Yugoslav squads which won two Olympic silver medals (in 1948 and 1952) and played in twoFIFA World Cups (in 1950 and 1954).
After retiring from active football in 1959, he was a successful manager, winning Yugoslav and Greek national titles with Partizan andPanathinaikos.
Bobek was born in Zagreb and started playing at the age of 13 for Viktorija, a lower league club, using his brother's registration papers. When he was 20 he became the center-forward ofGrađanski Zagreb.
He was the top scorer of theYugoslav First League twice, in1945 (25 goals) and1954 (21 goals).
He came toFK Partizan in 1946 and played for them until 1959. During his time in Partizan, he played 468 games and scored 403 goals, still holding the club record. Bobek won two Yugoslav League titles and theYugoslav Cup four times.
He scored his first goals in official matches, on 1 September 1946, in the 2nd leg of theYugoslav First League. He scored twice in a 6–1 home victory overBudućnost. On 5 January 1947, Bobek scored his first goal, in his firstEternal derby againstRed Star Belgrade, in a 3–4 home defeat. That was also the first goal in the Derby scored by Partizan player, because the previous two were own goals. On 8 June 1947 in a league match played inNiš between14. Oktobar and Partizan (1–10), Bobek scored eight goals – an absolute record that has never been broken until the end of Yugoslav First League or its successor leagues. He scored 25 goals in 22 matches in his first season of First League of SFR Yugoslavia and also won his first title.
In May 1951, Partizan played three friendly matches in England. The first match was played on 9 May, againstHull City and Partizan beat them 3–2. Bobek scored two goals in that victory. Three days later he again played brilliantly and scored a goal in Partizan's second victory over English teams. The result was the same three days later againstMiddlesbrough. One month later, he scored twice in one of the biggest victories in Eternal Derby, in a 6–1 home victory over Red Star. In November of that year, Bobek scored a six goals againstSloboda Titovo Užice, in aqualifying round of Yugoslav Cup, in a 11–1 away victory. A week later, he also set a record in the Yugoslav Cup. He scored eight goals in 15–0 home victory overSloga Petrovac.
On 29 November 1952, Bobek scored a goal in a 6–0 victory over a arch rival Red Star Belgrade in the final of the Yugoslav Cup. A three weeks before, he scored a hat-trick in a 4–0 home victory over one of the bestGerman teams at that time –1. FC Köln.
Bobek continued with great performances in following seasons. He scored a goal in biggest victory ever in Eternal Derby. After four minutes, he scored first goal on the match, in a 7–1 home victory over Red Star, on 6 December 1953. On 11 April 1954, he scored four goals in 8–0 home league victory overRabotnički.
Two years later after winning second Yugoslav Cup, he won a third. Again Partizan beat Red Star, but this time 4–1 and Bobek again scored one goal.
On 4 September 1955, Bobek scored a goal in first ever match ofEuropean Cup. Partizan draw (3–3) withSporting CP, inLisbon. He played all four matches in the1955–56 European Cup including a legendary victory 3–0 overReal Madrid in the quarter-finals.
Bobek played forCroatia U21 between 1943 and 1945.[2] He made his debut for theYugoslavia national team on 9 May 1946, in a 2–0 win overCzechoslovakia at theLetná Stadium, which was the nation's inaugural match asSFR Yugoslavia. He scored his first international goal against the same opponents on 29 September 1946, in a 4–2 win at theJNA Stadium.[3]
Bobek won twoOlympic silver medals for Yugoslavia, scoring four goals inLondon 1948 and three inHelsinki 1952.[4] He also appeared at the1950 and1954FIFA World Cups, scoring once in a 1950 4–1 win overMexico.[3]
On 17 October 1954, Bobek scored ahat-trick in a 5–1 win overTurkey, which were also his last goals on international duty. He reached 38 goals for Yugoslavia on that day and became the national side's top scorer, surpassingBlagoje Marjanović's 37-goal tally.[3] Bobek's record stood for over 66 years, until it was beaten bySerbia'sAleksandar Mitrović on 27 March 2021.[5]
After retiring from active playing Bobek went into management. In 1959 he became the coach ofLegia Warsaw inPoland, moving back to Yugoslavia the next season to managePartizan. He won three successive Yugoslav league championships with Partizan (1961, 1962, 1963) before being replaced byKiril Simonovski in 1963.
In 1963 Bobek moved toGreece where he spent four years at the helm ofPanathinaikos. He led the club to two Greek championship titles, including the first undefeated season for any Greek club, in the 1963–64 season.
Bobek returned to Yugoslavia and again took over Partizan, finishing second in the Yugoslav league in the 1967–68 season and third in 1968–69. After that, he returned to Greece to manageOlympiacos, spending ten months at the club. He briefly worked in Turkey, and then took over the recently promotedGalenika Zemun in the Yugoslav second level.
He was then hired byDinamo Zagreb for the 1972–73 season, but was sacked in November 1972 after only four months, with the club sitting at the bottom of the table, winning only two out of their first 13 games. During the 1974–75 season he returned to Panathinaikos for a second time, but without much success. He also coachedEspérance ST in Tunisia, and his last managing job was atVardar, with whom he won the1978–79 Yugoslav Second League East Division title and promotion to the First League.
In 1995, he was named the all-time greatest player of Partizan.[6] In 2009, Bobek's biography written by sports journalist Fredi Kramer was published.[7]
Bobek died shortly after midnight on 22 August 2010 in Belgrade.[6] He is interred in theAlley of Distinguished Citizens in theBelgrade New Cemetery.[8]
| Club | Season | League | Continental | Total | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Division | Apps | Goals | Apps | Goals | Apps | Goals | ||
| Partizan | 1946–47 | Yugoslav First League | 23 | 24 | — | 23 | 24 | |
| 1947–48 | 12 | 4 | — | 12 | 4 | |||
| 1948–49 | 17 | 13 | — | 17 | 13 | |||
| 1950 | 17 | 6 | — | 17 | 6 | |||
| 1951 | 21 | 9 | — | 21 | 9 | |||
| 1952 | 9 | 9 | — | 9 | 9 | |||
| 1952–53 | 12 | 7 | — | 12 | 7 | |||
| 1953–54 | 23 | 21 | — | 23 | 21 | |||
| 1954–55 | 18 | 16 | — | 18 | 16 | |||
| 1955–56 | 17 | 9 | 4 | 1 | 21 | 10 | ||
| 1956–57 | 15 | 3 | — | 15 | 3 | |||
| 1957–58 | 9 | 0 | — | 9 | 0 | |||
| 1958–59 | 5 | 0 | — | 5 | 0 | |||
| Career total | 198 | 121 | 4 | 1 | 202 | 122 | ||
| No. | Date | Venue | Opponent | Score | Result | Competition |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 29 September 1946 | Belgrade, Yugoslavia | 4–1 | 4–2 | Friendly | |
| 2 | 7 October 1946 | Tirana, Albania | 2–2 | 3–2 | 1946 Balkan Cup | |
| 3 | 11 May 1947 | Prague, Czechoslovakia | 1–2 | 1–3 | Friendly | |
| 4 | 22 June 1947 | Bucharest, Romania | 1–0 | 3–1 | 1947 Balkan Cup | |
| 5 | 3–1 | |||||
| 6 | 14 September 1947 | Tirana, Albania | 1–1 | 4–2 | 1947 Balkan Cup | |
| 7 | 19 October 1947 | Belgrade, Yugoslavia | 2–0 | 7–1 | Friendly | |
| 8 | 7–0 | |||||
| 9 | 31 July 1948 | London, England | 6–1 | 6–1 | 1948 Summer Olympics | |
| 10 | 5 August 1948 | London, England | 2–1 | 3–1 | 1948 Summer Olympics | |
| 11 | 11 August 1948 | London, England | 1–0 | 3–1 | 1948 Summer Olympics | |
| 12 | 13 August 1948 | London, England | 1–1 | 1–3 | 1948 Summer Olympics | |
| 13 | 19 June 1949 | Oslo, Norway | 2–1 | 3–1 | Friendly | |
| 14 | 21 August 1949 | Belgrade, Yugoslavia | 6–0 | 6–0 | 1950 FIFA World Cup qualification | |
| 15 | 18 September 1949 | Tel Aviv, Israel | 2–0 | 5–2 | 1950 FIFA World Cup qualification | |
| 16 | 30 October 1949 | Paris, France | 1–1 | 1–1 | 1950 FIFA World Cup qualification | |
| 17 | 13 November 1949 | Belgrade, Yugoslavia | 2–3 | 2–5 | Friendly | |
| 18 | 11 June 1950 | Bern, Switzerland | 3–0 | 4–0 | Friendly | |
| 19 | 29 June 1950 | Porto Alegre, Brazil | 1–0 | 4–1 | 1950 FIFA World Cup | |
| 20 | 7 September 1950 | Helsinki, Finland | 1–0 | 2–3 | Friendly | |
| 21 | 10 September 1950 | Copenhagen, Denmark | 2–0 | 4–1 | Friendly | |
| 22 | 24 June 1951 | Belgrade, Yugoslavia | 1–0 | 7–3 | Friendly | |
| 23 | 6–0 | |||||
| 24 | 23 August 1951 | Oslo, Norway | 2–0 | 4–2 | Friendly | |
| 25 | 4–0 | |||||
| 26 | 2 September 1951 | Belgrade, Yugoslavia | 1–1 | 2–1 | Friendly | |
| 27 | 20 July 1952 | Tampere, Finland | 4–0 | 5–5 | 1952 Summer Olympics | |
| 28 | 22 July 1952 | Tampere, Finland | 2–1 | 3–1 | 1952 Summer Olympics | |
| 29 | 25 July 1952 | Helsinki, Finland | 4–1 | 5–3 | 1952 Summer Olympics | |
| 30 | 21 September 1952 | Belgrade, Yugoslavia | 1–0 | 4–2 | Friendly | |
| 31 | 2–0 | |||||
| 32 | 4–2 | |||||
| 33 | 21 December 1952 | Ludwigshafen, West Germany | 2–1 | 2–3 | Friendly | |
| 34 | 26 September 1954 | Saarbrücken, Saarland | 2–1 | 5–1 | Friendly | |
| 35 | 3 October 1954 | Vienna, Austria | 2–1 | 2–2 | Friendly | |
| 36 | 17 October 1954 | Sarajevo, Yugoslavia | 1–0 | 5–1 | Friendly | |
| 37 | 2–0 | |||||
| 38 | 4–0 |
| Team | From | To | Record | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| G | W | D | L | GF | GA | GD | Win % | |||
| Legia Warsaw | 15 April 1959 | 31 December 1959 | 22 | 8 | 9 | 5 | 31 | 29 | +2 | 036.36 |
| Partizan | 1 July 1960 | 29 April 1963 | 80 | 45 | 16 | 19 | 168 | 98 | +70 | 056.25 |
| Panathinaikos | 1 July 1963 | 30 June 1967 | 145 | 99 | 30 | 16 | 321 | 109 | +212 | 068.28 |
| Partizan | 1 July 1967 | 30 June 1969 | 73 | 32 | 25 | 16 | 115 | 81 | +34 | 043.84 |
| Olympiacos | 1 August 1969 | 30 June 1970 | 40 | 24 | 9 | 7 | 60 | 30 | +30 | 060.00 |
| Altay | 1 July 1970 | 28 December 1970 | 13 | 4 | 3 | 6 | 8 | 12 | −4 | 030.77 |
| Dinamo Zagreb | 1 July 1972 | 20 December 1972 | 17 | 4 | 5 | 8 | 10 | 19 | −9 | 023.53 |
| Galenika Zemun | 1 July 1973 | 30 June 1974 | 34 | 10 | 7 | 17 | 32 | 44 | −12 | 029.41 |
| Panathinaikos | 5 September 1974 | 30 June 1975 | 41 | 19 | 12 | 10 | 71 | 46 | +25 | 046.34 |
| Panetolikos | 1 July 1975 | 30 June 1976 | 33 | 5 | 13 | 15 | 22 | 50 | −28 | 015.15 |
| Espérance | 1 August 1976 | 30 June 1978 | 54 | 20 | 17 | 17 | 83 | 70 | +13 | 037.04 |
| Vardar | 1 July 1978 | 30 June 1982 | 138 | 52 | 42 | 44 | 194 | 175 | +19 | 037.68 |
| Career total | 690 | 322 | 188 | 180 | 1,115 | 763 | +352 | 046.67 | ||
Partizan
Yugoslavia
Individual
Records
Ja sam Hrvat, normalno, ali istina je da sam zavoleo Srbiju.