Serbian national soccer team / world championships

Serbia
Србија / Srbija

World Cup record goalscorer:	Dragan Stojković (3, including 2 for Yugoslavia and one for Serbia and Montenegro) Aleksandar Kolarov (2 for Serbia)
World Cup record players:	Dejan Stanković (9, including 6 games for Serbia and Montenegro), also three Serbs with 9 games, which were played for the previous teams.
Rank :	13 (including the results of the previous teams)
Balance sheet
6 World Cup games 2 wins 0 draws 4 defeats 4: 7 goals
statistics
First World Cup game Serbia 0: 1 Ghana Tshwane / Pretoria ( ZAF ); June 13, 2010
Biggest World Cup victories Serbia 1-0 Germany Port Elizabeth ( ZAF ); June 18, 2010 Serbia 1-0 Costa Rica Samara ( RUS ); 17th June 2018
Biggest World Cup defeat Serbia 0-2 Brazil Moscow ( RUS ); June 27, 2018
successes
World Championship
Participation in the finals	2 ( first : 2010 )
Best results	Preliminary round 2010, 2018
Best placements in the countries that host the FIFA World Cup
(As of June 27, 2018 )

The article contains a detailed description of the Serbian national soccer team at soccer world championships , which succeeded the Serbian-Montenegrin national soccer team after the breakaway of Montenegro from Serbia . After the wars of Yugoslavia and the independence of most of the republics, the latter succeeded the Yugoslav national soccer team , which had previously participated in soccer world championships for the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, the Federal People's Republic of Yugoslavia and the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. The successes of the Yugoslav team were therefore initially attributed to the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, then Serbia and Montenegro and now Serbia in the FIFA statistics . She took part in the qualification for the first time in 2010 and reached the finals right away.

overview

Participation in soccer world championships (2 times)

year	Host country	Participation until ...	Last opponent	Result	Trainer	Comments and special features
2010	South Africa	Preliminary round	Ghana , Germany , Australia	23.	Radomir Antić
2014	Brazil	not qualified	-	-		In the qualification to Belgium and Croatia failed.
2018	Russia	Preliminary round	Brazil , Costa Rica , Switzerland	22nd	Mladen Krstajić

Statistics (data including 2018: 21 World Championships; percentages are rounded)

• Not qualified: 1 × (5%; 2014)
• Athletic qualification: 2 × (10% or 67% of the attempts)
  • Preliminary round: 2 × (10%; 2010, 2018)

2010 in South Africa

Serbs and Ghanaians before the kick-off for the Serbs' first World Cup game

→ Main article : Soccer World Cup 2010 / Serbia

After the Serbian-Montenegrin national soccer team had played their last game at the 2006 World Cup, Serbia initially unsuccessfully competed in qualifying for the 2008 European Championship , whereupon national coach Javier Clemente was dismissed. Since his successor Miroslav Đukić had little success, he was released in 2008. The Serbs then went into qualifying for the first World Cup in Africa with Radomir Antić as national coach. Opponents in the qualification were vice world champions France , Austria , Lithuania , Romania and the Faroe Islands . Serbia prevailed as group winners with seven wins, one draw and only two defeats and was thus directly qualified for the World Cup. The qualification was made perfect by a 5-0 win against Romania on the penultimate matchday, so that the 1: 2 defeat in Lithuania on the last matchday could be absorbed. France had to go to the playoffs against Ireland as second in the group and thanks to Henry's hand they were able to book the ticket for South Africa.

In South Africa, the Serbian team met Ghana in their first game and lost 1-0 to a hand penalty converted by Asamoah Gyan in the 85th minute. 11 minutes earlier, Aleksandar Luković received the yellow-red card . In the second game a 1-0 win against Germany with the first World Cup goal for Serbia by Milan Jovanović in the 38th minute succeeded. This time the Serbs played after the yellow-red card for Miroslav Klose from the 37th minute in the majority and Vladimir Stojković was able to save a penalty shot by Lukas Podolski in the 60th minute . The last game was then lost to Australia with 1: 2 and Serbia was eliminated as the best group bottom. Radomir Antić initially remained in office, but was dismissed in September 2010.

2014 in Brazil

In qualifying for the second World Cup in Brazil , the Serbs had to play against Belgium , Croatia , Scotland , Wales and Macedonia . Due to security concerns, no spectators from the visiting team were allowed in the games between Serbs and Croats. The Serbs began the qualification with Siniša Mihajlović as national coach. Serbia could only win four games, just as many were lost and two ended in a draw, so that Serbia only finished third with 12 points behind Belgium and three behind Croatia and was eliminated. When Serbia no longer had a chance to qualify in September 2013, Mihajlović moved to Sampdoria Genoa as coach . Belgium qualified as group winners for the first time since 2002, while Croatia also qualified through the playoffs against Iceland.

2018 in Russia

In the qualification , which began in September 2016, the Serbs, who have been coached by Slavoljub Muslin since May 2016, faced Wales , Austria , Ireland , Moldova and Georgia . The Serbs won six games, drew three times and only lost on the penultimate matchday in Austria, which meant that they missed the early qualification and were only able to secure it with a 1-0 win against Georgia on the last matchday. Of all group winners, they achieved the lowest number of points with 21 points and even the runners-up Switzerland and Italy had more points in their groups (27 and 23, respectively). Despite the successful qualification, Muslin was fired in late October 2017. Former international Mladen Krstajić took over the post on an interim basis .

In Russia, the Serbs won their opening game against Costa Rica 1-0. In the second game against Switzerland they took the lead in the fifth minute, but then had to accept the equalizer in the 52nd minute and the goal to make the final score 1: 2 in the 90th minute. With a 2-0 defeat against record world champions Brazil, they were eliminated after the preliminary round.

Ranking of the Serbian World Cup players with the most appearances

Along with Croatia, Serbia always provided the most players for the Yugoslav team's World Cup squad. Montenegrin players did not play a role in either the Yugoslav squad or Serbia & Montenegro. Simon Vukčević , at times a record national player for Montenegro, also played five internationals for Serbia & Montenegro, but not at a World Cup. The first World Cup squad in Yugoslavia in 1930 was in principle also a purely Serbian squad, as there were disputes between Serbian and Croatian officials in the Yugoslav association for some time before the tournament. Because the headquarters of the association was relocated from Zagreb to Belgrade , the regional association of Zagreb, which was against participating in the World Cup anyway, refused to interrupt or postpone the championship because of the World Cup. The associations of Split , Sarajevo and Subotica joined this refusal shortly afterwards . Therefore, only Serbian players and three players who played in France were nominated for the first World Cup tournament . Only then were players from Croatia in the Yugoslav World Cup squad.

01. Dragoslav Šekularac , Dejan Stanković (including 6 games for Serbia and Montenegro), Dragan Stojković (including 5 games for Yugoslavia and four games for Serbia and Montenegro) and Ivica Šurjak - 9 appearances in 2 tournaments

05. Safet Sušić and Zlatko Vujović - 8 appearances in 2 tournaments

07. Vujadin Boškov - 7 appearances in 2 tournaments

08. Jovan Aćimović , Vladimir Durković , Milan Galić , Miloš Milutinović , Rajko Mitić , Vladica Popović , Milutin Šoškić , Branko Stanković and Vladimir Stojković - 6 appearances in 2 tournaments

17. Vladislav Bogićević , Dragoljub Brnović , Dragan Džajić , Fahrudin Jusufi , Savo Milosevic , Ilija Petkovic , Vladimir Petrovic , Dejan Savićević (including 3 games for Yugoslavia and two for Serbia and Montenegro), Predrag Spasić , Nikola Žigić (including 2 games for Serbia and Montenegro), Branislav Ivanović , Aleksandar Kolarov - 5 appearances in one or two tournaments

Note: Players in italics only played for Yugoslavia (before 1998)

Ranking of the Serbian World Cup players with the most World Cup goals

01. Ivan Bek , Milan Galić , Dragan Stojković (including 2 for Yugoslavia and one for Serbia and Montenegro) and Todor Veselinović - 3 goals each

06. Stanislav Karasi , Slobodan Komljenović (both goals for Serbia and Montenegro), Aleksandar Petaković , Ivica Šurjak , Kosta Tomašević , Đorđe Vujadinović - 2 goals each

Note: Players in italics scored the goals for Yugoslavia only (before 1998). No player has scored more than one World Cup goal for Serbia.

World Cup captains

• 1930: Milutin Ivković (for Yugoslavia)
• 1950: Rajko Mitić (for Yugoslavia)
• 1954: Rajko Mitić (for Yugoslavia)
• 1962: Milan Galić (from 2nd game, for Yugoslavia)
• 1974: Dragan Džajić , Jovan Aćimović (game against Poland) (both for Yugoslavia)
• 1998: Dragan Stojković (substituted in 3 games) (for FR Yugoslavia)
• 2006: Savo Milošević (1st and 2nd game), Dejan Stanković (3rd game) (both for Serbia & Montenegro)
• 2010: Dejan Stanković
• 2018: Aleksandar Kolarov

Players banned from World Championships

• 2010: Aleksandar Luković received the yellow-red card in the first group game against Ghana and was suspended for the second group game. In the last group game he received a yellow card . Since Serbia was eliminated, this had no further effect on the tournament.

Share of players playing abroad in the World Cup squad

Legionaries made up the main contingent in the Serbs' first squad. Only Radosav Petrović (1 game) and Dragan Mrđa (no use) played in Serbia.

Year (games)	Number (countries)	Players (stakes)
2010 (3)	21 (1 in Belgium, 5 in Germany, 4 in England, 3 in Italy, 1 in the Netherlands, 1 in Poland, 1 in Portugal, 2 in Russia, 2 in Spain, 1 in Ukraine)	Milan Jovanović (3); Gojko Kačar (1), Zdravko Kuzmanović (3), Antonio Rukavina (0), Neven Subotić (2), Zoran Tošić (1); Branislav Ivanović (3), Nenad Milijaš (1), Vladimir Stojković (3), Nemanja Vidić (3); Aleksandar Kolarov (2), Aleksandar Luković (2), Dejan Stanković (3); Marko Pantelic (2); Bojan Isailović (0); Anđelko Đuričić (0); Miloš Krasić (3), Danko Lazović (3); Ivan Obradović (1), Nikola Žigić (3); Miloš Ninković (1)
2018 (3)	20 (1 in Belgium, 3 in Germany, 5 in England, 1 in Greece, 1 in Israel, 4 in Italy, 1 in Portugal, 1 in Russia, 2 in Spain, 1 in Turkey)	Uroš Spajić ; Luka Jović (1), Filip Kostić (3), Miloš Veljković (1); Marko Grujić , Nemanja Matić (3), Luka Milivojević (2), Aleksandar Mitrović (3), Dušan Tadić (3); Aleksandar Prijovic (1); Predrag Rajković ; Aleksandar Kolarov (3), Adem Ljajić (3), Nikola Milenković (3), Sergej Milinković-Savić (3); Andrija Živković (1); Branislav Ivanović (2); Marko Dmitrović , Antonio Rukavina (2); Duško Tošić (2)

Games

Serbia has played six World Cup games so far. Of these, two were won and four lost.

The team did not take part in the opening game, did not play against the host, defending champion or future world champions or newcomers to the World Cup.

All World Cup games
No.	date	Result	opponent		venue	occasion	comment
1	06/13/2010	0: 1	Ghana	*	Tshwane / Pretoria ( ZAF )	Preliminary round	First international match against Ghana
2	06/18/2010	1-0	Germany	*	Port Elizabeth ( ZAF )	Preliminary round
3	06/23/2010	1: 2	Australia	*	Nelspruit ( ZAF )	Preliminary round	First international match against Australia
4th	06/17/2018	1-0	Costa Rica	*	Samara ( RUS )	Group game	First game against Costa Rica
5	06/22/2018	1: 2	Switzerland	*	Kaliningrad ( RUS )	Group game	First game against Switzerland
6th	06/27/2018	0: 2	Brazil	*	Moscow ( RUS )	Group game

Highest victories and defeats

The team achieved their highest victories against the following countries in World Cup tournaments:

•  Costa Rica : Preliminary round 2018 - 1-0 (only game against Costa Rica)
•  Germany : Preliminary round 2010 - 1-0 (only win against Germany)

The team suffered their biggest defeats in World Cup tournaments against the following countries:

•  Australia : Preliminary round 2010 - 2-1 (only loss to Australia)
•  Ghana : Preliminary round 2010 - 0-1 (only game against Ghana)
•  Switzerland : Preliminary round 2018 - 1: 2 (only game against Switzerland)

See also

• Football World - Statistics - Serbia on fifa.com
• fifa.com: "Statistical overview: records and milestones"

References and footnotes

1. ↑ In Uruguay (1930), Brazil (1950), Switzerland (1954), Sweden (1958), Chile (1962), the Federal Republic of Germany (1974), Spain (1982) and Italy (1990) with the Yugoslav team, in France (1998) with the Serbian-Montenegrin team
2. ↑ The placements from 5th place onwards were determined by FIFA without any placement games. See: All-time FIFA World Cup Ranking 1930-2010 (there under results for "Serbia"; PDF; 200 kB)
3. ↑ fifa.com: World Cup participant Serbia separates from Muslin
4. ↑ Two of them in the 2nd division, one of which plays for a Welsh club