FK Sloboda Užice

Sloboda Užice
	Sloboda Užice
Basic data
Surname	Fudbalski club Sloboda Užice
Seat	Užice , Serbia
founding	1925 (as URSK Sloboda )
Colours	black - red
president	Dragan Subotić
Website	fksloboda.rs
First soccer team
Head coach	Ljubiša Stamenković
Venue	Gradski stadium Užice
Places	12,000
league	Serbia League
2018/19	16th place (Prva Liga) ▼
home	Away

Sloboda Užice ( Serbian: Фудбалски клуб Слобода Ужице, Fudbalski klub Sloboda Užice ), or simply Sloboda , is a Serbian football club from the city of Užice . He plays in the SuperLiga , the top division in Serbian football . The name Sloboda translated means "freedom".

history

1925 to 1945 - beginnings as URSK Sloboda

The club was founded in Užice in 1925 on the initiative of local workers as part of the URSK Sloboda sports club ( Užički Sportski Klub Sloboda , Užičan Workers' Sports Club Sloboda). It was brought into being by the communist activists Miloš Marković and Josip Šiber. As a result of Marković's efforts, Radnički Niš was founded two years earlier . From the beginning, football had the highest priority in the club over the other sports . The first official match was played on June 24, 1926 against Mladi Radnik , today's Radnički Kragujevac , which ended in a 2-2 draw. In the 1928/1929 season, the club began to play with six other clubs in the regional Morava league. In 1929 the football department also joined the Yugoslav Football Association.

Due to financial difficulties, the club could no longer participate in the league in the early 1930s and therefore only played friendly games . During this period the association reduced its activities. At the same time, its members increasingly focused on politics. Due to its connections to trade unions , the association was infiltrated by more and more members and sympathizers of the then banned Union of Communists of Yugoslavia , which gained more and more importance in Užice.

The authorities reacted by withdrawing permission to use the term Radnički in the club name in 1932 . Radnički means something like "worker" and comes from the club's relationship with the labor movement . In December of the same year, the club's license was finally withdrawn and it was forced to cease its activities on charges of spreading pro-communist ideas. After the founders left the communist party, they merged with the FK Era , another club in the city, and from then on was called USK Građanski ( Užički Sportski klub Građanski , Užičer Sportklub Građanski, while Građanski can be translated as "civil") . From then on, the distance from communism and the promotion of a new identity as the association of citizens of Užice took place.

In 1937 they won the Morava League and thus the first championship, but the promotion did not succeed due to the playoff defeat against Erdoglija from Kragujevac. In 1938 the club was stopped again by the authorities, but after a year the ban was lifted again and the club now continued its game operations as Budućnost Užice . During the Second World War , the club had to cease its activities again, because the Kingdom of Yugoslavia was invaded, occupied and divided up by the Axis powers in April 1941 . The region around Užice fell under the administration of the Wehrmacht , but the city subsequently became a center of resistance for partisans . Numerous club members fell during the liberation struggles, including players and supporters of the club. At the end of 1944, the Germans finally withdrew and from 1945 football could be played again.

1945 to 1993 - rises and falls

On May 5, 1945, the association got its original name back, Sloboda, which translated means "freedom", and was now run as Sloboda Titovo Užice . In the following period of communist rule, the city was named Titovo Užice, which was called Titos Užice , after the Yugoslav President Josip Broz Tito until 1992 . The next year Sloboda won the Morava league for the second time and played in the higher leagues of Serbia from then on. At the same time, due to a reorganization of the Yugoslav Football Association, from now on they belonged to the Association of Kragujevac .

During this period one rose to the Serbian league, at that time still a regional league. In 1956, the club achieved its greatest success up to that point when it rose to the so-called IV Zona (IV Zone), one of the five lower leagues of the 2nd Yugoslav League, in which Sloboda could not hold itself. In the following years Sloboda Užice missed two more times as champions of the Association of Kragujevac promotion to the 2nd division. In 1963 they failed a third time during the qualification at FK Bor . In 1965 they finally returned to the second division after almost ten years.

In the two following seasons, the club missed the championship victory as autumn champions and thus also the promotion to the 1st Yugoslav league . In the following years the development of Sloboda stagnated and after a reorganization of the league system they finally continued to play in the Serbian league. In 1980 you were again a member of the 2nd league east, in which you could finally establish yourself, so in 1988 you also became part of the new uniform 2nd league and in 1992 was even on the verge of promotion.

The 2nd league of Yugoslavia lasted until 1992, because in national competition the clubs from Croatia and Slovenia left the league after the 1990/91 season after these countries had declared their unilateral independence. The Macedonian clubs followed them after the 1991/92 season, while most teams from Bosnia and Herzegovina did not finish the season as the Bosnian War broke out there in April . After the country had disintegrated into its individual states due to the war in Yugoslavia , Serbia and Montenegro came to terms and formed a new Yugoslavia in April 1992 , but shortly afterwards UN sanctions were imposed on the country due to the civil war .

In addition, UEFA decided to exclude the Yugoslav national football team, which had already arrived in the European Championship district, from the 1992 European championship . It also followed the exclusion of all Yugoslav clubs from all European competitions. This ultimately led to the suppression of the previously successful Yugoslav football from the international football scene, so that the slogan "Sport is sport, there is no place for politics" was not taken into account here. During the 1994/95 season, UEFA allowed all Yugoslav football clubs to return to the European Cup, while the national team remained excluded.

Finally, another fate struck the Yugoslav clubs. Because instead of being able to pick up where the clubs had to leave off in the spring of 1992, UEFA decided that the points that had been achieved by then for the UEFA five-year ranking of all Yugoslav clubs should be canceled. This decision, the collapse of the country, the league and its immediate consequences should ultimately have catastrophic long-term effects on all of Yugoslav football, including Sloboda Užice. Although the club rose to the first division for the first time in 1993, but at an extremely unfavorable time, in the following seasons there was finally a constant fall in the lower leagues of the country.

1993 to today - a time of sadness and a return to first class

From the mid-1990s, Sloboda fell into a deep crisis. The club fell into the subclass and spent a large part of it during this period. However, 2010 marked a turning point. In the 2009/10 season they played in the Serbian League West , one of the four third leagues in Serbia. On June 24, 2010, Sloboda Užice and the second division club Sevojno from the district of the same name from Užice merged to Sloboda Point Sevojno Užice . This played after Sevojno had made it to second place in the 2009/10 season, in the 2010/11 season in the highest Serbian league, the SuperLiga, and was also able to secure relegation with a 6th place. Since the 2011/12 season the club is again called Sloboda Užice.

A well-known former player and coach of the club is the former coach of the Ghanaian national soccer team Milovan Rajevac . The former coach of the Serbian national soccer team Radomir Antić also played at the club . Radomir Antić also coached the top Spanish clubs Real Madrid , Atlético Madrid and FC Barcelona . In addition, defender Nemanja Vidić played in the youth of Sloboda Užice. The Sloboda supporters known as Slobodaši traditionally support all clubs in the Sloboda family.

Stadion

View of the Gradski stadium Užice 2013.

The home stadium of Sloboda Užice is the Gradski stadium Užice , built in 1947 , which is also known as the Stadium September 24th or Stadium Slobode and today seats 12,000 spectators. Before the official opening game, there was a test match between Sloboda and Slavija Sarajevo on June 9, 1946 . The stadium was officially opened on September 24th with a friendly match between the home team and Partizan Belgrade that ended 6-0.

A year earlier the partisans liberated the city of Užice from the occupation by the Wehrmacht on the same day , so this date was selected and is the origin of the nickname Stadium September 24th . The visitor record was set in 1967. In the Yugoslav Football Cup , Red Star Belgrade opposed the home side in front of 18,000 spectators. The game ended with a 1: 2 for Belgrade . A first renovation took place in 1980.

The first meeting after an extensive renovation between 2010 and 2011 took place on August 21, 2011. Opponent Partizan was defeated 2-1. On July 26, 2013 it was announced that the stadium would be equipped with a floodlight system. The first game under floodlights was the game on the 5th day of the SuperLiga on September 14, 2013 against Partizan.