Yugoslavia Reunited - A Road to Glory with FK Borac Šamac

[Venator77]

Borac is a Yugoslavian semi-pro club, located in Bosanski Šamac, competing in one of the six 4th tier leagues in the Yugoslav Reunited database. This club holds a special place in my heart as two of my family members used to play for them years ago. Now it is my duty to take this club up to the very top of world football. So, 100 years after Borac Šamac was founded, I took charge. I have already completed three seasons of this save, but each season will be getting their own reply.

Here's the results of the first season, playing in the 2019/20 - Četvrta Liga Yugoslavia - Premijer Liga Bosne.

This was a fantastic season, as several of my new signings on free transfers made an instant impact and we walked the league. The closest contender Buducnost never really threaten our position despite managing to inflict our only loss of the season. We get promoted to the Treća Liga Yugoslavia Istok, one of the three 3rd tier leagues.

Core Players
Mirel Ibrahimovic

This was my first signing for Borac, and what a player he was. He is a striker who used to play for Tuzla City before he was released. His goal-scoring prowess that season was truly a wonder to behold, scoring a total of 75 competitive goals in three seasons, also winning three Golden Boot awards in a row. As such, not only has he earned his vice-captaincy, he is also the club's one and only legend, surpassing Zoran Pupecevic (my assistant manager in the first season) status as an icon. Here are his stats after the end of Season 3.

Samir Isanovic

This lad was present in the side before I arrived, I think he may be the only original Borac player left. This is a testament to his ability as a central and left midfielder, and his creativity was delicious to watch. This guy doesn't score a lot, but when he does, its either from free kicks, or a banger from outside the box. He has rightfully earned the captain's armband since his fantastic performances. His stats after season 3.

Ivan Setka

A left back I picked up on a free transfer. He mainly plays as an Inverted Wingback, which is perfect as I used that position. Solid on defense and sometimes comes up with some moments of magic.

 

[TaymuirFC]

Fantastic first season absolute domination getting that points total. Interesting team but good dynamic that it was family related.

 

[Venator77]

Thank you. I was quite surprised to find this team and being able to play it.

Anyway, here is season 2.

Our first season in the 3rd tier was also very successful. We weren't quite as dominant as last season, having almost lost the title to FK Inđija, who were the only team we failed to beat. Mirel Ibrahimovic put in a fantastic run of goals, securing that season's golden boot. Back-to-back promotions, here we go!

 

[Venator77]

Welcome back, this will be the last completed season reply before I go into depth with Season #4. This season, we played in the Yugoslav Second League after getting promoted last season.

I was quite surprised how we walked the league straight to promotion as champions. The new rules of the league allowed me to finally sign a couple of foreign players. My best players were Riccardo Boscolo Chio, an Italian midfielder released from Inter Milan, Cyriaque Mayounga, a CAR central defender rejected from Wolves, and Giulio Rota, a newgen Italian midfielder who was signed from the backarse of Georgia interestingly enough.

So now that we reached the promised land of the Yugoslav First League, we have to make sure we stay in it. Stay tuned as I will be going more in depth with the save in the 4th season.

 

[Venator77]

Right, now we are getting into the juicy stuff. I shall be going more in detail with the save now that the post has caught up with my progress. Note that after we lifted the Second League title with a few games to spare, Borac finally turned professional, with improved staff and training and all that stuff with pro clubs. We are still projected to struggle in the league and get relegated so it will be tough. In this version of the Yugoslav First League, the 18th placed team is relegated to the Second League while the teams in 17th and 16th play a relegation play-out, where the loser is relegated to the Second League.

September has finally arrived and we have played 9 match days covering July and August. Here are the results:

We had a fantastic start to the season with an excellent 2-0 opening day victory against Rijeka, who were touted for mid table. We did get an unfortunate loss to
Radnički Niš due to a last minute goal by Milosav Sicovic. We bounced back with three wins in a row, including two potential relegation six pointers against Gorica and Zrinjski Mostar and a hard fought victory against a Europe-chasing Osijek. The game against Zrinjski was highly surprising, as they were really poor that game and we were excellent. We broke the biggest win record that game, the previous being a 5-0 victory for Dinamo Zagreb against someone else who name escapes me.

We then had our most difficult match of the season, league leaders Dinamo Zagreb away, who won three First League titles in a row. We did unfortunately lose this game, but we made Zagreb work hard for their victory, an encouraging sign for the season ahead. We followed that match with a win against Sarajevo away. We were knocked out of the Cup by Rijeka seeking revenge, but I wasn't too fussed, the Cup to me isn't important and they played better than us. Another crucial six-pointer against Domzale ended in our favor before we held a very strong Red Star Belgrade to a 0-0 draw. After nine league match days have been played, here is the league table:

3rd place chasing European football. Who would've thunk? I don't expect this to last very long, but we'll sure fight hard.

Players to Watch

Martin Ivanusa

Our new star striker, signing from 3rd tier Rudar Velenje for €300k, he is part of a new generation of strikers for Borac. Although his recent injury problems had limited his appearances to 3, he has already got a goal to his name and hopefully he can bang more of them in as the season progresses.

Milos Rakic

Our new star central midfielder, signing from Inter Zaprešić for €800k, his performances has been excellent, and he had been voted player of the year last season for his previous club and with good reason. He was a bit expensive, but I am very happy he's here.

Miha Prsa

A promising right midfielder, signing from Bravo Ljubljana for €250k, he has also impressed with his playmaking skills on that side of the pitch.

Anes Mehic

This guy was probably the steal of the season, signing on a free transfer after his contract with Sloboda Tuzla ran out. He is our new first choice goalkeeper, a current international for the vegetated Bosnia national team (all the national teams for the formerly independent Yugoslav states are vegetated, meaning the only players for these national teams are regens or fake, made up players). He has started all 9 of our league games and kept 6 clean sheets, very impressive.

Summer Transfers

Thanks for reading. Next post will cover everything to the winter break. Feel free to ask any questions, I'll answer them immediately.

 

[Venator77]

Well well well, it is the end of the Yugoslav winter transfer window and things have taken a very surprising turn. Before we can get into the Borac stuff, the World Cup of 2022 has occurred and Italy ended up as victors, beating the Netherlands 3-2 after going 2-0 down. Anyway, here is the run from September to the end of February.

We were pretty inconsistent from September to the middle of October, losing to Partizan Belgrade at home and Hadjuk Split away, both extremely tough fixtures. Partizan was chasing the league title and Spilt chasing European football. We also had narrow victories against opposition near the bottom, which gave me worrying signs that we were about to start sliding. However, everything changed when the World Cup began in November. We fought hard for a 2-2 draw at home to Maribor before the World Cup. I decided to make a formation change right after, hoping I could put together a better string of results. We briefly came back to league action with an excellent 5-0 victory against relegation battlers Domzale before once again going into break, this time the winter break.

The winter transfer window opened and it was pretty quiet, but I'll go more into detail once I get into that section. When we came back, we went on a fantastic run of form, beating Split who had run into a horrible run of form, 5 games win less, and went through all of Feburary collecting maximum points, including a very surprising 4-2 away victory against Partizan Belgrade. Combined with Dinamo Zagreb's recent slip ups, we are actually in the race for the league title. The title race has been blown wide open and here is the league table after 23 matchdays.

We are three points behind league leaders Dinamo Zagreb, and with a tough run of fixtures coming up, including Dinamo Zagreb at home, this may decide if we can actually go the full monty and end up as winners. Four points seperate 1st and 4th, with FK Sarajevo also chasing the league title.

Winter Transfers

Not much in the way of tranfers this winter. Signed a better GK in Danijel Micanovic from FK Rad for 27k and a backup left back from Dinamo Zagreb for 66k. Also sold two fringe players for a total of 10.75k and also allowed some youth players out on loan or on free transfers.

That's it for today's post on Borac Šamac, stay tuned for the epic finale of the 2022/2023 Yugoslav First League! Who will win? Post your predictions down below and see you next time.

 

[Venator77]

Well, I am not a smart person as I have accidentally ****** up my save just as I started the new season. Oops. I'm going to restart this save and track my progress in full so lets see how I finished my fourth season with Borac.

I am absolutely beyond words. We ******* did it! Our first season in the First League and we did a Leicester by pulling off the most amazing run towards the league title I have ever seen. We were relentless, beating title rivals Sarajevo and holding back Dinamo Zagreb and just... wow. Dinamo Zagreb crumbled after the draw and ended up in 3rd place, missing out on Champions League football. If I didn't **** up, we would be entering the Champions League at the Group Stage. All that money will certainly help out this small club and attract better players. But alas, Season 4 will be the final season of this particular save. Thanks for following me through this journey and I hope to see you guys in the new save very soon!