Miroslav Blažević died on this day in 2023 after a long battle with cancer.
Although there were often jokes about how he hides his age, according to official dataand was born on February 10, 1935 in Travnikas the sixth child in the family of mother Kate and father Mate.
He got the nickname Ćiro when he was still a little boy, but his mother was afraid of that name and she asked not to call him that because he was mocked. Namely, in one children’s play, the main character was the puppet Ćiro, who spoke just like little Miroslav Blažević, as if he had a speech impediment.
She called him Braco because her sister Jozefina was called Seka. On the field, the people of Travni recognized him and started chanting “Ćiro, Ćiro” and it was over. The boy’s nickname was received and followed him throughout his life and career.
Even though his life was marked by football, Miroslav Blažević was a very good skier in his youth and became “the first BiH skier to beat Slovenians in skiing”, as he recalled a few weeks before his death by posting on Facebook a photo from 1952 from a competition in which he represented junior selection of Travnik won first place in cross-country skiing at 10 kilometers.
Two years later, he was supposed to go to the skiing championship in Mrkopalj, but before that he stopped by Zagreb to visit his sisters, and there he ran into a former coach from Travnik, who invited to come to Dinamo. Miroslav Blažević accepted the invitation, gave up skiing, but before going to Dinamo he had to serve in the army, just as the military service was extended to 24 months, which means he lost two years.
After leaving the army, instead of joining Dinamo, he went to Rijeka, where he met his wife Zdenka and had a daughter Barbara, but due to a problematic knee, his career did not last long.
After leaving Rijeka, he spent three years in Switzerland, in Sion and Moutier, so that in 1966, ended his playing career at the age of 31. He got his first coaching job two years later, also in Switzerland, in Vevey, and in 1976 he led the Swiss national team for two matches as a temporary coach.
He returned to Rijeka as a coach in 1979, and a year later to Dinamo, where he in 1982, the title became a legend. It’s later won world bronze with Croatia in 1998.
Let’s remind you, he was also the coach of the national team of Bosnia and Herzegovina and probably laid the foundations for what will happen later with Safet Sušić and going to the World Cupreports Report.
(www.jabuka.tv | Photo: Facebook)
