Yugoslav First League

The Yugoslav First League (Serbo-Croat: Prva Liga, Пpвa Лигa) was the premier football league in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia (1918–1941) and socialist Yugoslavia (1945–1991). It may also refer to the first league of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (1991–2003), before it was renamed Serbia and Montenegro.

The First League Championship was one of two national competitions held annually in Yugoslavia, the Yugoslav Cup being the other.

Kingdom of Yugoslavia (1923-1940)

This was the first club competition on a national level for clubs from Kingdom of Yugoslavia (named the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes until 1930). The league was started in 1923 and the first four seasons had a cup tournament format, while the first round-robin league competition was held in 1927. In the period from 1927 to 1940 seventeen seasons were completed, with all the titles won by clubs from Croatia (Građanski Zagreb, Concordia Zagreb, HAŠK Zagreb and Hajduk Split) or Serbia (BSK Belgrade and Jugoslavija Belgrade).

It was governed at first by the Croatian-named Nogometni Savez Jugoslavije (Football Association of Yugoslavia), founded in April 1919 in Zagreb,^[1] until in late 1929 disagreements arose between the Zagreb and Belgrade branches of the association. This resulted in the association headquarters being moved to Belgrade in May 1930 where it adopted the Serbian name Fudbalski Savez Jugoslavije and continued operating the league until it was suspended due to the outbreak of World War II.^[2] With the creation of the Banovina of Croatia in 1939, separate Croatian and Serbian leagues were established, which operated until World War II.

Champions and top scorers

Performance by clubs

SFR Yugoslavia (1945-1992)

Champions and top scorers

^ A special format tournament was held to re-affirm the newly found Yugoslav unity. The tournament consisted of eight teams; Serbia, Croatia, Macedonia, Vojvodina, Slovenia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and a selection of JNA players.

Titles by club

Performance by clubs/republics

*Known as BSK Belgrade before 1957

All time top goalscorers

Complete list of players who scored 100 goals or more in the 1946-1992 SFR Yugoslavia period.
Source: RSSSF; Last updated 14 December 2007 ^[3]

Notable clubs (at least 10 top-flight seasons or at least one title)

Over the years the Yugoslav First League featured many different teams, but there were always a number of teams that stood out, typically from the bigger cities. Among these were:

Successor leagues

The 1990-91 season was the last season held in its usual format, with clubs from all federative units participating in the championship. The breakup of the country also broke up its top flight league into several smaller ones.

Slovenia and Croatia depart

In June 1991 Slovenia declared independence and Croatia followed suit in October of the same year. This meant that their football associations separated from the Football Association of Yugoslavia so they both started their own football leagues. The Slovenian PrvaLiga was launched in late 1991, while the Croatian Prva HNL saw its first edition in 1992. Affected by the ongoing war in Croatia, the season was held over the course of a single calendar year, from February to June 1992. Both leagues have been going on ever since.

1991–92 season

The 1991-92 season season was the last season held officially under the name of SFR Yugoslavia, even though Slovenian and Croatian clubs have already abandoned the competition. Clubs from the remaining four federative units all took part in the competition, but since the Bosnian War broke out towards the end of the season, Bosnian clubs never finished it. (Željezničar of Sarajevo only managed to play 17 out of 33 scheduled fixtures, while Sloboda Tuzla and Velež Mostar ended the season with a few games short of completing the season.) Still, since most of the games were played as planned, Crvena Zvezda of Belgrade is credited with winning the last Yugoslav First League championship.

Macedonia and FR Yugoslavia

Macedonian clubs abandoned the competition after the 1991-92 season because the new Macedonian First League was launched the following season. For the 1992-93 season Bosnian clubs were all on hiatus due to full blown fighting that developed there, with the sole exception of Borac of Banja Luka (the strongest Bosnian Serb side at the time) which temporarily moved to Belgrade and joined the newly formed league featuring clubs from Serbia and Montenegro, this time restyled as the First League of FR Yugoslavia. (Serbia and Montenegro, the only ones left after other four member republics declared independence, renamed their country Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.) The league lasted under that name until the 2002-03 season, when the country changed its name so the league was renamed First League of Serbia and Montenegro. Finally, in June 2006 Montenegro declared independence and peacefully departed the union, so from the 2006-07 season onwards Montenegro started operating separate top flight football league supervised by its football association. On the other hand, as the legal successor of Serbia-Montenegro state union, Serbia also got the continuity of the country's league that was formed as Prva liga (First League) in 1992, and renamed and rebranded as Superliga in summer 2005.

Bosnia and Herzegovina

Meanwhile, the football situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina got complicated. Due to the outbreak of ethnic warfare in April 1992 that turned into widespread conflict by the summer of 1992, no games were played in the 1992-93 season. In late 1993 some parts of the country re-launched football competitions, but just as the country was divided along ethnic lines, so was football - in 1993 Bosnian Croats launched the First League of Herzeg-Bosnia in which Croatian clubs competed.

As for the Bosniak part of the country, apart from a brief half-season in 1994 (won by Čelik Zenica), the game was put on hold until the 1995-96 season when the Bosniak league was formed. Bosnian Serbs also organized their own First League of the Republika Srpska the same year.

The setup with three separate football leagues operating in Bosnia and Herzegovina continued until 2000.

In the fall 2000 for the 2000-01 season, the UEFA-fostered Premijer Liga BiH was launched, with Croat and Bosniak clubs only, while the Serb clubs boycotted the new competition, continuing in their own separate league. Under pressure from UEFA, the Serb clubs also joined two years later for the 2002-03 season. Premijer Liga functions today as the unified top level league of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Two entity-based leagues still exist (essentially, modified version of the ethnic leagues - the Serb one stayed the same still with the name Republika Srpska First League, while the Croat and the Bosniak one merged into a single competition called Federation BiH First League), but have been pushed to the second tier of the football pyramid and serve as feeder leagues to the Premijer Liga.

Today's top flight successors

•  Bosnia and Herzegovina → Premier League of Bosnia and Herzegovina (1998–present)
•  Croatia → Prva HNL (1992–present)
•  Macedonia → First Macedonian Football League (1992–present)
•  Montenegro → Montenegrin First League (2006–present; from 1992–2006 had a joint league with Serbia)
•  Serbia → Serbian Superliga (2006–present, from 1992–2006 had a joint league with Montenegro)
•  Slovenia → Slovenian PrvaLiga (1991–present)

Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (1992–2002)

Champions and top scorers

The FR Yugoslav years consisted of the two remaining republics Serbia and Montenegro. This lasted until FR Yugoslavia was renamed Serbia and Montenegro in March 2003.

See also

• Yugoslav Cup
• Football Association of Yugoslavia
• Yugoslavia national football team
• Serbian SuperLiga

References