Vujadin Boškov

Serbian footballer and manager (1931–2014)

Vujadin Boškov (, ; 16 May 1931 – 27 April 2014) was a Serbian footballer and manager. A midfielder, he played 57 matches for the Yugoslavia national team. He experienced his greatest success as a coach in 1990, when he won the European Cup Winners' Cup with Sampdoria. He also reached the European Cup final in 1981 with Real Madrid and 1992 with Sampdoria. He also won the Yugoslav First League as technical director and the La Liga, the Copa del Rey twice, the Serie A and the Coppa Italia twice as a coach. Throughout his career as a football manager, he stood out both for his many successes, as well as due to his unique sense of humour and memorable ironic comments, which were used to dissolve tension during post match interviews; these led him to become a popular figure with football fans during his time in Italy. FC Vujadin Boškov, Vojvodina's training facility in Veternik, was named after him in 1996 and in February 2022, he was posthumously admitted to the Italian Football Hall of Fame.

Boškov was born in the Serbian village of Begeč, from Novi Sad in Bunarska Street to father Boja, a village carpenter, and mother Marija. His family lived in Novi Sad before moving to Begeč during the Second World War where his grandfather lived. Vujadin had an older brother named Aca (also a footballer), who was six years older than Vujadin, who died very young. Vujadin also has two younger sisters, sister Verica (Vera) and sister Danica (Dada), the latter still living. Boškov graduated from the Trgovačka akademija (trade school). A fan of his local team, Boškov played with Vojvodina for most of his career (1946–1960), as well as continuously supporting it. In 1961 he moved to Italy to play for Serie A club Sampdoria for one season (1961–62), before accepting a stint as a player coach at Swiss side Young Fellows Zürich (1962–1964). Boškov then returned to the club that made him as a player – FK Vojvodina – and spent seven seasons (1964–1971) as a technical director, leading the club to winning one Yugoslav league championship in 1965–66.

He also became a playing member of the Yugoslavia national team and made his debut for them in a June 1951 friendly match against Switzerland. He earned a total of 57 caps (no goals) and was part of the team that won the silver medal at the 1952 Olympic football tournament. Also he played at the 1954 and 1958 FIFA World Cups. His final international was at the latter tournament against West Germany.

Boškov soon developed a successful international coaching career with stints in the Dutch Eredivisie with ADO Den Haag (1974–1976) and Feyenoord (1976–1978); the Spanish La Liga with Real Zaragoza (1978–79), Real Madrid (1979–1982) and Sporting de Gijon (1983–84); the Italian Serie A with Ascoli (1984–1986), Sampdoria (1986–1992, 1997–98), Roma (1992–93), Napoli (1994–1996) and Perugia (1999); and the Swiss league with Servette (1996–97). Arguably his greatest achievement as a coach came in 1991, when he steered Sampdoria to the Serie A scudetto. The following season, he led the club to the European Cup final, where they lost 1–0 to Barcelona at Wembley. He also coached Yugoslavia at Euro 2000, where they famously lost 4–3 to Spain in Brugge and later went out to hosts the Netherlands in the quarter finals, after losing 6–1 to the Dutch. Footballer Vujadin Savić is named after Boškov. In 1996, the FK Vojvodina training facility in Veternik was named after Boškov. Corriere dello sport published a book of his quotations e. g. "Quando l'arbitro fischia it is a penalty". In February 2022, he was posthumously admitted to the Italian Football Hall of Fame, by decision of leading figures in the Italian media.