The good results of Zvezda and Partizan rest on foreign players, and at the same time, only a few players from the youth teams of both clubs entered the first team. It turns out that with a greater interest in basketball and full stands of the Arena, we got even greater hatred between the fans of the two clubs, and a continuous series of mutual insults, name-calling and fights. Also, large state investments have not yet led to Zvezda and Partizan becoming self-sustainable, which is a prerequisite for obtaining a permanent Euroleague license and thus earnings from television and other rights.
In the previous three weeks, after the president of the country, Aleksandar Vučić, in one of his countless television appearances, complained that Crvena zvezda and Partizan were racketeering the country, and the focus was on basketball clubs, a lot of new things were heard from the leaders of the two clubs and from Vučić himself in the subsequent performances. But all those news about the spending of millions of euros only confirmed that the state, embodied in Vučić, through the state and city budgets, public companies and companies connected with state affairs, covers a large part of the expenses of both clubs and thus practically maintains them in the elite Euroleague.
It was learned that in the last seven seasons, including the current one, the state, the city of Belgrade and state-owned enterprises paid a total of 33 million euros to Crvena Zvezda, and 27 million to Partizan. At Zvezda it is more than 56 percent of all income, and at Partizan it is more than 40 percent. In addition, the state does not block them due to tax debts, rents them the largest hall at three times lower than the market price and finds them sponsors among private companies that earn money from public works. Other revenues come, as the management claims, from sponsorship of private companies, sales of tickets, players and television rights, Euroleague payments...
In recent days and weeks, the omnipresent president of the country has kept the topic of financing two of our biggest basketball clubs in the public eye, because, first of all, it was useful for him to put pressing problems, starting with the post-election crisis, on the back burner, and at the same time, for the umpteenth time , emphasize his merits and supremacy. He tried to be neutral in the name-calling and criticism, but still he could not hide his hostility towards the club whose fans still call him names from the stands.
photo: vladimir sporčić / tanjug...and Ostoja Mijailović
"WE WON'T FIGHT EACH OTHER"
Everything flared up after the final of the Serbian Cup in Nis, which was won by Red Star, when Partizan coach Željko Obradović violently reacted to the repeated calls from Zvezda fans that it was a state project and called on his management to present all the data on the business. This was followed first by Vučić's fierce response, who called Obradović's performance a "disgusting attack on the state", and then Partizan's administration issued a statement and presented data on revenues in the last seven years, since Ostoja Mijailović has been at the head of the club (see the text "Who cares about Željko" Obradović and why", "Vreme", number 1729). Zvezda responded to that with its financial report, which covers the period from 2011 to today, when Nebojsa Čović was at the head of the club, and the state also responded by sending a budget and tax inspection to both clubs.
Čović then appeared in the "Podkast with Luka and Kuzma", hosted by Sportklub journalist Luka Spasovski and former basketball player Vladimir Kuzmanović, and in an hour-long performance praised himself, his club and president Vučić, revealed a few quirks and incidents with players and coaches, but on in the end, despite the claims that he does not want to argue and fight, his remarks against Partizan only contributed to the debate between the two camps in the public flaring up and intensifying.
Then Vučić spoke again, repeating that without the state and him personally, neither Zvezda nor Partizan would survive, and extending his merits to private companies, which, he says, he is persuading to sponsor these two clubs.
Čović's name-calling, and it seems Vučić's even more so, forced Partizan President Ostoja Mijailović to come out publicly himself, so he tried to respond on Television Prva in such a way as to retaliate against his main rival, but also not to accidentally injure the president and his party colleague.
"The state followed our growth, supported it and now gives us five times more than in 2017. But we also raised our wages almost 50 times than seven years ago. And I am not interested in how much the state supported other projects. I am grateful for that. People tell me that I made a name for myself in KK Partizan, and in 2017, Partizan was about to close down and if that had happened, they would have cursed me and my generations forever. When Željko Obradović came, Pixi came the same year, Kari Pešić also came. And the state helped with all that, why not say so. But using the narrative that Partizan is a state project is not fair. Then let Zvezda explain how it received twice as much money as us last year, 11 million euros compared to our 5,6 million", said Mijailović and emphasized that he is against insulting the president of the country and the president of Zvezda from the stands and against "shooting" with the "eternal a rival".
The next day, Nebojša Čović was a guest on the same television, and despite the fact that he already emphasized in the first sentence that no one from Zvezda wanted to "fight" and that Mijailović's performance the day before was quite conciliatory, he continued to fiercely call out the management, coaches and fans Partizan.
"We will not fight. We have no one to fight with. Just let them agree on who is lying, the president or the coach? In our country, at least as long as I am the president of the club, the job of all the coaches is to deal with the field... An atmosphere is created that Partizan is the opposition vanguard, and they insult everyone living there, starting with the president of the country and continuing. You insult, you insult, and you get money. So then you stop insulting for a while, then you insult again. Zvezda fans never did that. They insulted Milošević and Tadić, but it was an ideological disagreement," Čović explained.
According to him, everything in Zvezda is transparent, fair and according to the law, and they did not receive a single dinar from the state indirectly, which cannot be said for Partizan.
"The company gets a job with the state, and transfers money from there. More precisely, the 'Millennium Team' helped us once and we are very grateful to them. And as for these others, let them say how much they got from telecommunications, how much from the purchase of cars, how much from construction work and so on," said Čović, alluding to the business of companies owned by Mijailović and others from the Partizan administration.
EXAMPLE OF LITHUANIAN ŽALGIRIS
The state's huge investments - more than 60 million euros in the last seven years - are justified in various ways, and it is undeniable that it has positive effects: Zvezda and Partizan have become competitive in the Euroleague and dominant in the regional ABA league, fans are setting attendance records, about the atmosphere the matches in the Arena are talked about all over Europe and the world, the income of both clubs apart from state investments, especially Partizan, has grown enormously, basketball is increasingly popular among young people...
On the other hand, the good results of both teams rest on foreign players, there are more and more of them from season to season and a lot of money was wasted on failed reinforcements, and at the same time only a few players from the youth teams of both clubs entered the first lineups and there is no indication that they will be different in the near future. The euphoria that follows the matches of these two clubs was not transferred to other clubs and competitions, and it turns out that with greater interest in basketball and full stands of the Arena, we got even greater hatred between the fans of the two clubs, and a continuous series of mutual insults, name-calling and fights. Also, large state investments have not yet led to Zvezda and Partizan becoming self-sustainable, which is a prerequisite for obtaining a permanent Euroleague license and thus earnings from television and other rights.
The government of Aleksandar Vučić really invests much more state money in sports, but, at least when it comes to investments in the two strongest basketball clubs, it is done without any long-term plan and goal. Perhaps the example of Lithuanian Žalgiris is good for comparison, because it is also a club from a small but basketball country, which is a permanent member of the Euroleague and has been more successful in the last seven years than both Zvezda and Partizan.
This year's budget of the club from Kaunas is 13 million euros, seven million less than Partizan's and almost three more than Zvezda's. Out of those 13 million, Žalgiris receives two million from the city of Kaunas (which is 15 percent of the total revenue) and that is all the help from the state, and the rest is 4,1 million euros from sponsorships and advertisements (real, not delegated by the state). 1,9 million euros from television rights and five million euros from ticket sales. Lithuanians are the majority in the team and with four foreigners they currently have one more win than Zvezda and two less than Partizan. In addition, neither the president of Lithuania nor the mayor of Kaunas call out the clubs for financing them, nor state that they illegally allocate money from the budget and pressure public and private companies to be sponsors, nor do the managements of Žagiris and the second strongest club Ritas from Vilnius fight with each other are accused of crime and fraud, nor is an atmosphere of war between the fans of the two clubs created in the public.
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