Ilic's First Derby: Partizan Hosts Red Star Sunday

Sasa Ilic played so many Eternal Derbies as a Partizan player and captain that he lost count of them long ago. Tomorrow evening, from the bench, he faces his first.

The press conference at Partizan’s Humska ground began around 10 a.m. today, before the squad set off to prepare for the trip to the Marakana. There, on Sunday at 7 p.m., the 180th Eternal Derby will be played in the eighth round of the Serbian SuperLiga, a match Ilic, despite having spent almost his entire career in it, will experience from the other side of the touchline for the first time.

“I have played many derbies as a player, this will be my first as a coach,” Ilic said.

Partizan’s coach made no secret of the fact that a full stadium matters to him, and that he wants to pass that feeling on to his players.

“Everyone knows tomorrow’s match is the biggest in our country, this is what we live for. I expect a full South Stand, and a good game. I know the fans can help our players, and I hope Partizan can break a certain tradition at the Marakana.”

He repeated the same message moments later, when a question turned to the atmosphere building at the stadium: “I expect a lot of fans, I expect a full South Stand, that’s what matters most.” Captain Nikola Simic was even shorter and clearer: “We’re going for the win!”

A first home win to build on

Partizan go into the derby without their best form of the season, but with a fresh result that carries some weight. In the previous, seventh round, the black and whites won 3:1 (3-1) at home against OFK Beograd, with goals from Igor Miladinovic, Milan Aleksic and Bogdan Kostic, their first win in front of their own fans this season. After that round, Partizan sit 11th in the table with seven points.

At the top, the picture looks different from what was being discussed last week. Red Star share first place with Vojvodina, both on 15 points, though the side from the Marakana have played two games fewer. IMT are third with 13 points, while Zemun sit bottom of the table with just one point. Still, as Ilic himself said, the current standings rarely decide a derby.

In his remarks, Ilic also pointed back to Partizan’s last European match against Getafe, as proof the team can deliver its best when it matters most, and said that confidence now carries over into the derby.

Do foreign coaches stand a chance at the Marakana?

While Ilic goes into the derby as a man who knows it inside out, Red Star’s bench will be occupied for the first time tomorrow by Albert Riera, and that is the other side of the story. The record for Eternal Derbies pitting foreign coaches against domestic ones is not kind to the visitors from abroad.

Since 2003, when a coach from outside the former Yugoslavia first sat on one of the two benches, five such matches have been played against a domestic coach, and all five have been lost. Germany’s Lothar Matthaus suffered two of those defeats, both 0:2 (0-2), first against Zoran Filipovic, then against Slavoljub Muslin. Avram Grant (a 0:1 loss to Robert Prosinecki in 2012), Ricardo Sa Pinto (a 0:1 loss to Vuk Rasovic in 2013) and Barak Bahar (a 1:2 loss to Igor Duljaj in 2023) followed the same script. The only foreign coach ever to win an Eternal Derby was Walter Zenga, in 2005, but the opposing bench that day was also occupied by a foreigner, Germany’s Jurgen Rober, so even that win does not break the pattern against domestic coaches.

Riera, then, faces that statistic on top of facing Partizan. Ilic sits on the other bench, and on paper the numbers favor him tomorrow, even though he himself has repeated more than once that paper and tables mean little before a derby.

What’s next

The match is played tomorrow, Sunday, September 6, at 7 p.m. at the Rajko Mitic Stadium. Until then, the only certainty is that one man will walk into that match from the bench for the first time in his career instead of from the pitch, and an emotion he has felt a hundred times will return to him in a completely new way.