| Full name | Fudbalski klub BASK | ||
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| Founded | 1903 | ||
| Ground | Careva ćuprija (Capacity: 3,000) |
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| Chairman | Slobodan Stanojević | ||
| Manager | Blagoje Paunović | ||
| League | Serbian SuperLiga | ||
| 2010–11 | Serbian First League, 1st Promoted |
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FK BASK (Serbian Cyrillic: ФК БАСК) is a football club from Belgrade, Serbia. It is one of the oldest clubs in Serbia. The club currently competes in the Serbian First League (2nd tier).
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In the Kingdom of Serbia there had been many sports sections and societies, whose members were constantly increasing in number. So in the year of 1891 Belgrade gymnastics society “Soko” was established. One student, Andra Nikolić, became chairmen of the parliament, minister of education and foreign affairs, academic and writer (today in part of Belgrade called Senjak, there is a street named after him, Dr. Andra Nikolić”), together with Hugo Buli, was also the initiator of foundation “The first Serbian association for games with ball”, on 1 May 1899. This association for games with ball is considered also the first Serbian football club on territory of ex Yugoslavia and Serbia. Unfortunately, this club had been closed very soon and it disappeared. Nevertheless, it succeeded in organizing one real contest on the new football field built in Guberevac.
Members of Gymnastics association SK Soko continued with ball games, and their enthusiasm had not diminished. They have been gathering on one meadow in Jugovićeva Street. The new younger members had constantly joined them, and then started generation replacement. These lovers of ball decided finally to organize again and once more to establish their own club. On member’s gathering, after the usual training, under the open sky on their field, they have founded their club. Among others, unavoidable Hugo Buli, Steva Stefanović, Milan Bajić, Ljuba Jovanović, Mita Đorđević, Mita Stamenković, Boba Marković, Momir Korunović, M.Milosavljević and others were present.
Inaugural meeting was held on 18 April 1903, under the clear sky, on unoccupied lot in Braće Jugovića Street, where in that time was summer playfield Belgrade’s gymnastics association “SOKO”.
Assembly’s Participants had by acclamation elected Ljubomir Jovanović, who later became minister in governments of Kingdom of Serbia and president of national assembly, and satisfied with the work done, went home. When had met the following day on the playfield, somebody said: “Oh, my God, people, we have founded a club, and nobody had remembered that we should give it a name.” Really, in very big exaltation the previous day they have completely forgotten about that “detail”.
They have assembled again and then they have started making suggestion. People said that this debate had been very long and at some moments also very bitter, until Ljuba Jovanović, newly selected president, did not propose the name “SOKO”. The others have all agreed, so on 18 April 1903. of the old calendar, the first football club in Kingdom of Serbia appeared (FK Bačka from Subotica had been founded in 1901, two years before „SOKO“, but on territory of Austro-Hungary in that time).
The first and foremost problem of newly founded club was a playfield. The field in Jugovićeva Street was too tight for the playground so another suitable place in Venice bog was found, between current Belgrade fair and railway station. However, they could not stay there because the river Sava had risen up, flooded and destroy the playfield. Finally, an adequate playground was found in part of Topčider and at foot of Košutnjak’s wood, in the place of current Range station Topčider. Although the playground was quite far from the city in that time, “SOKO” arranged it very well and stayed there for a full 27 years, until the state did not expropriated it for railway needs.
Some years later, the stadium got an athletics track and a small tribune for standing. Together with “SOKO”, this playground entered into the history. Apart from many local games, the first international match in Serbia, between the national team of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia and national team of Romania was played on it, which ended with the victory of the later, with by 2:1.
It was the third international match of the Yugoslav national team at all. The match with Romania that was played on 8 May 1922, in the honour of the wedding of HRH King Alexander and Romanian Princes Maria, was observed by over 1,500 spectators, which is remarkable for that time. The Yugoslav team, which was in that period called “White Eagles”, played in a following line-up: Fridrih, Kujundžić, Šifer, Šterka, Dubravčić, Pupec, Babić, Zinaja, Perška, Vinek, Šojat, and the shooter of the single goal we made, was Šifer. At the start of its work, SK SOKO had faced a problem playing games, because it was the only club in this country and it simply could not find any rival. Because of that, the players of SK SOKO usually played among themselves.
It was noted that one of the first and the biggest public games among two teams of SK SOKO had been played on "St. George´s Day" (Đurđevdan), on May 6, 1904, in the honour of the celebration of the centenary of the First Serbian Uprising. In that match (the score is unknown) following players participated: Stevan Stefanović, Milan Bajić, Vladimir Skobla, Dimitrije Đorđević Piperski, Dimitrije Stamenković, Nikola Spasić, Hugo Buli, Vlada Krstić and others. Six months after the clubs foundation, Serbian football and engineering pioneer, Danilo Stojanović–uncle Dacha, on 14 September 1903, founded the football club Šumadija so SOKO got their first domestic rival.
Nevertheless, two years have passed until the match between two oldest clubs in the Kingdom of Serbia took place, mostly because of very bad traffic relations between the two cities. Finally, on July 20, 1906, Šumadija and SOKO met in Kragujevac, and SOKO won by 6:1. In the rematch, on August 27, 1906, SOKO won again, but this time more convincingly, with the score of 9:0. Unknown chronicle registered that the crown prince himself, HSH George Karađorđević, was also present. For the history of Serbian football, it is very important to mention that these were the first matches played between two domestic clubs. This tradition of the rival matches between FK BASK (former SOKO) and FK Šumadija, only be held again in 1993 on the occasion of the celebration of the 90th anniversary of FK BASK. Since then, every year on St. George's Day, on May 6, and on Krstovdan, on September 14, when they celebrate their respective holiday Slava´s, this two clubs visit each other and continue the tradition of playing friendly matches.
Everything died with the beginning of the First World War. The footballers replaced the ball with a rifle. In concurrence of events, after the Serbian Army retreat through what would be called the "Calvary in Albania", very large group of players that formed the club ended up in Rome. Very soon, they agreed to renew their club while in the exile, so they joined Italian club Pro-Roma and, as a special section under the name Soko Pro-Roma, they started playing matches with other Italian clubs. During 1918, as the war drew to its end, Soko Pro-Roma played in the Cup of the city of Rome, and after they defeated all the rivals, mostly renowned Italian football clubs of that period, they won the first place and the first international trophy of the Serbian football. The final was played on June 16, 1918, on Piazza Dissiena, and after the triumph of SOKO’s players, the flag of the Kingdom of Serbia flew high on the mast.
The following players played in the team and reached this success: Dušan Elezović, Pavle Bajić, Brana Veljković, Jug Nikašinović, Miloš Simović, Milan Miodragović, Svetozar Popović- Kika, Denić, Pavle Lukićević and Živojin Simonović.
Hard days of postwar renewal also hit SK Soko. The club was immediately re-established and continued with work, but the results of the team were alarmingly bad. At beginning, the club was suffering heavy defeats, but this did not discourage the management and players. In constant struggle with problems, at the end of the second decade of the 20th century, the club was neck to neck with the best Belgrade clubs, BSK and SK Jugoslavija, and in 1929 Soko made their first triumphs. In the same year, they also successfully played against other Yugoslav First League clubs from Zagreb, Građanski, HAŠK, Concordia, and in Split, in the same year, they defeated Hajduk as well. It was the first defeat of Hajduk on its own playing field and in front of its own public by another club from Yugoslavia.
For the first World Championship in Montevideo, in 1933, SOKO had three of its players in the Yugoslav national team: Milovan Jakšić, goalkeeper, who with great displays in Uruguay deserved the nickname “El grande Milovan”, Milutin Ivković, captain and the best player of the team, and Branislav Hrnjiček, as a reserve player.
But then, in the days od SOKO’s climax, the members of the same-named gymnastics society, whom it belonged since the founding, and whose name it carried so high and proudly for a long time, did not want SOKO more in their surroundings. The management and the players of SOKO have accepted this decision placidly, and on the assembly held in 1933, they decided to become independent, and they gave the club a new name - BASK, Belgradian academic sport club.
Almost simultaneously, the club ran into another, harder misfortune. Belgrade assembly for the necessities of the railway took away from BASK the playfield in Topčider, so for some time, the club literally ended up on the street. Later, the BASK got the playfield behind Belgrade electrical central, which Radnički got after the Second World War, whose players became known as the “Masters from the Danube”, the name they still have today, even though they are today located in New Belgrade but this playfield ceased to exits long time ago. The resolute management and great team nothing could put out of track. BASK had even struggled for permanent place in competition for the Yugoslav championship, which was played in the begin of 1930s using a cup system. In the season 1932-33, BASK was a member of the Yugoslav First League, which had double score system. In competition of 11 teams, BASK took the 5th place behind the champion–BSK, second-standing Hajduk Split, FK Jugoslavija and HAŠK, but in front of Građanski Zagreb, Concordia, Primorje Ljubljana, Slavija Sarajevo, Slavija Osijek and FK Vojvodina. In the next championship BASK archived 7th place. In the season 1936-37, it was 6th once more. Next season, 1937-38, it accomplished the 4th place, and that was the highest achievement of the club behind the new champion HAŠK, and behind BSK and Građanski, but again in front of clubs such as Slavija Sarajevo, Jugoslavija, Hajduk Split and others.
The following year, the league grew to 12 clubs and BASK was on the 8 place. In the last championship, before the Second World War, which had been played in two leagues–the Serbian and Croato-Slovenian, with 10 clubs each, final mini league was held with 3 the best clubs from each group. BASK did not get the standing required for the finals. During all this championships, BASK had brought out many excellent players. In addition to mentioned Milovan Jakšić, dr Milutin Ivković and Branislav Hrnjiček, there were also and Miodrag Ranojević, Stojan Popović, Miroslav Lukić, Đorđe Detlinger, Kolnago Ferante, Aleksandar Tomašević, Mladen Sarić and others. Among all these names, the name of Aleksandar Tomašević should be especially distinguished, because he was one of the main top scorers in the third decade, and in that regard also and the biggest rival of the famous Blagoje Marjanović. Tomašević left a deep mark in Yugoslav football as a trainer as well in the period after the war. He was the main coach of the biggest Yugoslav clubs such as FK Partizan, Crvena Zvezda, Hajduk Split, and the founder of the Radnički Belgrade. He also coached FK Sarajevo, Olimpija Ljubljana and Vardar Skopje.
After the Second World War, many of the clubs mentioned in the earlier did not exsist. A similar thing happened with BASK. New football collectives were founded, with new names that were appropriate to new times and circumstances.
In parts of Belgrade, Senjak and Topčider hill, therefore mostly on territory of former BASK, club named Senjak has been founded, and it competed with a lot of success in Belgrade leagues. In this environment was born the idea, that this club could take over the tradition of BASK of gathering young people from that part of the city, especially because the club had got the playfield on the edge of Topčider park, very close to former stadium of SK SOKO, where it is today.
The idea, nevertheless, could have not been realized immediately. No sooner than 1953, on 50-anniversary of Soko and BASK, on the Annual assembly, in the presence of many members of the pre-war club, FK Senjak took over the name BASK and all glorious traditions of this oldest football collective in former Kingdom of Serbia. For the first president of renewed club, with votes of assembly participants, famous representative Milovan Jakšić, “El Grande Milovan“ was chosen. Since then, until 2005, the FK BASK competes more or less successfully in Serbian League Belgrade.
In this period, the biggest success had been the winning of Cup of the Belgrade liberation in 1958, the victory in the Cup of Yugoslavia in territory of Belgrade football association, and in the same year, the defeat in the final game of Yugoslav Cup for the Serbian territory from FK Borac Čačak. In addition, after the convincing triumph and the first place with nine points of advantage in the first Belgrade league, in 1971, the FK BASK competed in the Serbian league–north group. More recently, FK BASK has been competing in the Serbian First League, whose member it is since 2005.
Last update: December 8, 2010. Note: Flags indicate national team as has been defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.
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