Football history has seen many great teams. From the Dutch Totaal voetbal masters in the 1970’s, the Brazilian national teams of yesteryears and Arrigo Sacchi’s back-to-back European champions of AC Milan to Pep Guardiola’s Barcelona. All great teams are remembered for something. In 1991, Red Star from Belgrade or rather, Crvena Zvezda, became the last Eastern European team to win the European Cup. Still, as great an achievement as that was, they’re not widely remembered as one of the great teams. This is despite their tactical flexibility and the insane quality of their counter-attacks. As I said, all great teams are remembered for something. Red Star’s squad of 1991 should be remembered for their counter-attacking of which they were the masters.
As Red Star won the cup, of course it would make sense to look at the final. However, Red Star decided to play for penalties, which they did and then won after scoring all five, and therefore killed the game out of respect for their opponents, Olympique Marseille. So I decided to instead look at the two semi-finals against Bayern München, which best symbolise what Red Star were all about, aggressive pressing and counter-attacking with pace.
It’s difficult to discuss Red Star’s system, as it changes in game between a back-four and back five, two or three central midfielders and one or two strikers. If you would make me, I’d say it was a sort of 4-1-4-1, but as I will illustrate, it was not in anyway rigid to a formation. No matter what system though, the intent was clear; defend deep, press aggressively in midfield, and counter with speed. They executed this perfectly against Bayern to reach the final
Before we start, I want to apologize for the differing quality in the illustrations, as content to watch the full matches in HD was impossible to find.
Shape
In the first-leg the line-up read like the following: Stojanović; Radinović-Belodedici-Marović-Najdoski; Jugović; Binić-Prosinecki-Savićević-Mihajlović; Pančev.
As you can see, the team starts their defending quite low, with Binić, Prosinecki, Savićević and Mihajlović making up a classic midfield four. However, Jugović (the holding midfielder) is nowhere to be seen in this picture, as he’s dropped in to basically make up a back five with Belodedici acting as a libero behind the defence.
Same shape to be seen here, but notice the contrasting positions of Binić on the right and MIhajlović on the left, as this will be discussed further later.
In the return leg, the shape is the same, and here you can see Jugović in between Savićević and Prosinecki. One change to the line-up though, with Sabanodzović replacing Najdoski.
As the ball entered midfield, Red Star started pressing aggressively to win it and unleash the likes of Pančev, Binić and Savićević on the counter. They used a mix of both zonal and man-marking, as can be seen below with the right back, Radinović (circled in yellow), leaving the defensive line to mark his opponent. The same can be said about Jugović who marks his man closely. Prosinecki and Savićević combine with one pressing and the other covering.
Belodedici – the libero
Miodrag Belodedici was one of the classiest defenders you’ll ever see. The Romanian won the European Cup with Steaua Bucharest a few years earlier and was handed the key role in Red Star’s defence. Belodedici played as the libero, sweeping up behind the other defenders, controlled the defence after his will and regularly stepped up with the ball to initiate attacks.
The above picture is from the second-leg with the other three defenders circled in yellow. Belodedici is just out of shot.
Now, Belodedici is visible, organizing his fellow defenders. We can clearly see the man-marking from Jugović, Radinović and Marović with the Romanian sweeping behind them.
Here is an interesting shot of the back-four. Belodedici as the libero again, with the other three making up almost a diamond defence in this instance. It could regularly look like this too, with Mihajlović, defending far more on the left than Binić on the right, filling in as a left-back.
Belodedici earned the nickname “The Deer” because of his elegant style of play, and would regularly glide through the defensive line with the ball at his feet ready to set up attacks.
With the ball, it usually looked a normal back-four, with Jugović (blue) trying to get on the ball in midfield. However, as seen below, it had a different look when Belodedici (yellow below) stepped out.
He was both the man cleaning up defensively and organizing the team, as well as the deep-lying playmaker, who exchanged duties with Jugović to get the mercurial talents of Prosinecki and Savićević on the ball as much as possible.
Binić and the counter-attacking position
Dragisa Binić was one of the fastest footballers you’re likely to see. He himself claimed to run 100 metres in 10.5 seconds, and although that remains questionable he definitely had an unusual level of pace in him. He was stationed on the right, with clear instructions to stay as high as possible to be an outlet for the team when defending, which in turned would create the famed counter-attacks.
The image above highlights the deepest Binić would go, but compare it to the position of Mihajlović on the left.
In the image above, we can see that Binić (red circle in the bottom right corner of the image) is not really bothered about defending. Ridiculously high positioning, but made possible due to the position of Mihajlović (red circle on the left wing) and the makeshift back-five. Notice the absence of Jugović, who’s followed his man into the defensive line. Savićević and Prosinecki working close together again.
Mihajlovic is nowhere to be seen in the above image, with Binić (red) again staying high. We’ve seen this recently with Cristiano Ronaldo in Carlo Ancelotti’s 2014 Champions League winning Real Madrid, and the result was the same; the trophy.
The video above shows the first goal of Red Star’s away win against Bayern in the first-leg. It’s an absolutely fantastic goal, with the sheer speed of the attack frightening making it almost impossible to defend against. After winning the ball by the corner flag, a few quick, short passes are exchanged before Prosinecki releases Binić down the right flank with a brilliant pass. Here is the ultimate demonstration of the tactic of leaving Binić high and releasing him from defensive duties as Bayern can’t cope with his pace and then his inch-perfect pass finds the onrushing Pančev who makes no mistake. It’s brilliant, it’s beautiful and it’s a breathtaking counter-attack.
This is the second goal of that semifinal first-leg. While maybe not as well-worked all the way through the pitch, it’s still class at a very high speed. The clearance finds Pančev, who collects the ball. Savićević immediately realises the opportunity and starts his run. Pančev plays a perfect pass and Savićević’s control and pace take him away from the Bayern defender easily. The Montenegrin genius finishes emphatically, which is even more impressive when you see the way the ball wobbles up just as he is about to hit it. Again, impossible to defend against.
Conclusion
Even without discussing the tactics, Red Star had an incredible team. Sinisa Mihajlović is well-known by most, but the likes of Darko Pančev and Dejan Savićević both finished as runners up for the Ballon d’Or in 1991 and were brilliant players. Sir Alex Ferguson had the following to say when asked about his Manchester United team’s Super Cup win against Red Star a few months after they beat Bayern and Marseille to the trophy:
“The entire Red Star side was terrific. Dejan Savicevic, Darko Pancev, Robert Prosinecki, Sinisa Mihajlovic, Vladimir Jugovic… all brilliant players.”
Clayton Blackmore, who played for United in that game, said the following:
“They could have been even better than the current (2011) Barcelona side”.
High praise indeed, as it should be for the team from Belgrade. Tactically fascinating and one of the best counter-attacking teams of all time, they should be remembered in the same brackets as other great teams. Unfortunately, the team was split up in the following years, as the Balkan wars broke out in full force, and football lost a brilliant team. Some players went on to achieve success elsewhere, including Mihajlović and Savićević, who scored for Milan in the 1994 Champions League final, and some never managed to reach their previous heights. That shouldn’t in any way taint the memory of these players though, as they will remain heroes and immortal to the fans of Red Star for eternity.
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