Karl Aage Præst

Danish footballer (1922 2011)

Karl Aage Præst, also spelled Carl Aage Præst, (26 February 1922 – 19 November 2011) was a Danish football player. Playing in the left winger position, Præst won two Serie A championships with Italian club Juventus FC. He played 24 games and scored 17 goals for the Danish national team from 1945 to 1949, and won a bronze medal at the 1948 Summer Olympics. He is a Danish Football Hall of Fame inductee.

Born in Copenhagen, Karl Aage Præst attended the Royal Orphanage. The orphanage became the youth team of football club Østerbros Boldklub (ØB) in 1936, and Præst was among the first boys to join ØB. In his second year in the ØB youth team, Præst scored 57 goals in 16 games. Præst played around 250 games while at ØB. After the Olympics, Præst signed a professional contract with Italian club Juventus FC, and was thus banned from the amateur only Danish national team. With Juventus, Præst won the 1949–50 and 1951–52 Serie A championships. Though considered fast in Denmark, Præst was not as fast as most Italian defenders, but succeeded through his dribbling skills. This provoked DBU to move on the issue of ex professionals, and it was decided that following a quarantine of two years, ex professionals were allowed to re enter the Danish football league. At ØB's 75th anniversary in 1969, Præst and Flemming Nielsen arranged an old boys exhibition match between the 1948 Olympic team and Juventus FC, with the proceeds going to ØB. In November 2008, Præst was voted into the Danish Football Hall of Fame, for his achievements with Juventus FC and the Danish national team. Præst died on 19 November 2011 at age 89.