When Montenegro regained its independence on May 21, 2006, sport "swam" into the unknown, it was the area that was perhaps the most worried about - somewhat expected, because of the small base, but above all because of the desperate infrastructure, the system that needs to be built .
18 years have passed since then, sport brought a lot of joy to our country, made Europe and the world hear about one of the smallest countries, but the worry and anxiety from the first day of May of independent Montenegro still exists today - it seems maybe even more than then.
The best example is the two most trophy-winning sports in the country - water polo and women's handball, which already reached the top in the first years of independence, but they seem to have failed to use all of that in the right way.
"SHARKS" AND "LIONS" IMMEDIATELY RAISED THE BAR TOO HIGH
And while the appearance of the red and gold flag and the word Montenegro at major competitions was impressive for the people of Montenegro at the start, the new sports nation immediately began to show talent - the "sharks" and "lionesses" were in the lead.
Even during the last years of the state union, it was clear that Montenegro has a top generation of water polo players, but legendary ones Petar Porobić and his boys had to start from scratch... From qualifying for the European Championship in Division B, the lower division championship in Manchester and finally the golden Malaga in 2008 when they Veljko Uskokovic, Nikola Janović, Vladimir Gojkovic and other masters conquered the Old Continent.
Four years later, the handball players of our country ascended to the throne, in just a few months the girls Dragan Adžić they won the European gold and the Olympic silver, and the medal would probably have been even more brilliant if the "lionesses" in London had not had a famous referee in addition to the great Norway. Bonaventura.
The success of the national team in these two sports was also followed by the clubs, so Primorac was European champion in 2009 (a year later and vice-champion), Kataro won the LEN Cup, while Budućnosti's handball players celebrated twice in the Champions League - in 2012 and 2015.
DYNAMITE EXPLOSION
Along with water polo and women's handball, he brought the most prestigious title to Montenegro Dejan Zlaticanin - In 2016, Dynamite won the lightweight championship belt in the most prestigious boxing version of the WBC in the United States of America.
"This is history for me and my Montenegrin people," Zlaticanin said after he was knocked out Franklin Mamani.
After that, our boxer did not "fly" so high, and realistically the belt itself is one of the biggest miracles considering the attitude of the state towards the guy who was known to be born for great things.
MARY'S FLIGHT OVER MUNICH
She achieved the greatest success in the history of Montenegrin athletics and one of the greatest in our sport Marija Vuković, who won the silver medal at the European Championships in Munich in 2022.
It was the crown of the career of the girl who 12 years earlier in the junior competition was the world champion and proof that something went wrong in her athletic development after the gold in the younger categories.
Marija wrote a beautiful story at the Olympic Stadium in Tokyo in the year of summer at the Olympic Stadium in Munich, when she entered the grand final at the Games held in 2021, eventually taking 9th place.
HANDHOLDERS - VICTORIES TO REMEMBER
Due to the great and strong competition, it would not be realistic to expect Montenegrin handball players to fight for medals, but the "lions" many times drew more than the maximum...
They brought Montenegro their first appearance at a major competition (European Championship in Norway 2007), but also several victories that are equivalent to miracles.
Olympic and world champion Denmark, giants such as Sweden, Germany and Croatia fell in front of the boys in red...
Unlike practically all other collective sports in Montenegro, the national handball team now has a more talented generation than the one from the first years after independence. The "lions" showed it two years ago when they were 11 at the European Championship, of course with the aforementioned victory over Mikel Hansen and friends...
However, talent is often not enough either. The proof is the last barrage when Montenegro was held by Italy - the selection that returns to major competitions after 26 years left the players as they are Branko i Miloš Vujović, Nebojsa Simic and others without a World Cup.
BASKETBALL - AND MORE THAN EXPECTED
When it comes to competition, along with football, it is the biggest in basketball, especially men's, so everything the "reds" did was worthy of respect...
And there were many memorable moments - from the first trips to the Eurobasket, through the triple Nikola Ivanovic defeated the great Serbia in Belgrade, to two consecutive placements at the Mundobasket, an unforgettable match with the "dream team" of the United States of America, and secured qualification for the Olympic Games in Paris.
Great stories are also written by female basketball players, who are regular participants in European championships, and were close to the semi-finals several times, especially in 2015, when they lost to Spain in the drama of the quarter-finals - a team that in the following years will be European champions twice and Olympic vice-champions once.
There were also successes on the club level, primarily thanks to the Buducnost Volija basketball players, who won the ABA League in 2018 and brought the Euroleague to Podgorica and "Morača".
FOOTBALL - "PLIVA" REPRESENTATION, CLUBS AT THE BOTTOM
Football is always a special story, a world phenomenon, so it is also the most difficult to achieve great results in it, and yet the national team of Montenegro - from a country with one semi-serious stadium and mostly frivolous clubs - was several times in the game to go to the big competition. .
The closest during the fall of 2011, when the earliest Andrija Delibasic in stoppage time brought 2:2 against the country of football - England, and soon in the barrage to go to Euro 2012 against the Czech Republic...
That year, the "falcons" flew so high that, according to the conductor's baton, they were unforgettable Zlatka Cica Kranjčara, reached the 16th place in the Fifa ranking of the best world teams.
Montenegro is far from the conditions and base that practically all national teams have, and even the closest ones - from the region, but it is almost always there, far from outsiders, always with the hope that a big competition will arrive, always with world-class talents such as after Dejan Savićević i Predrag Mijatović certainly and Mirko Vucnic, Stevan jovetić, Stefan Savic, even with new kids like Vasilija Adžić or Viktor Đukanović.
On the other hand, apart from rare good performances by Zeta or OFK Titograd, rare individual flashes (which, admittedly, are no longer there), clubs from Montenegro seem to have slept through the last 18 years - confirmation of this is that they are behind the 1st CFL on the UEFA list only championships of Andorra and San Marino.
The lack of infrastructure, system work, lagging behind other countries in everything - it's a wonder how the national team in such conditions, and with such a league, is still "swimming" above the surface, the question is how long it will last if the approach is not changed urgently...
In contrast to 2006, Montenegro can now boast of a women's national team that is growing at an incredible speed and has recently been impressing with its game and results.
JUDO, BOXING, KARATE, VOLLEYBALL, RADOVIĆ, DUKIĆ, BOJANA GOJKOVIĆ...
One of the great results for Montenegro is the silver medal from the World Judo Championship, which he brought from Paris in 2011 Srdjan Mrvaljević. Everything after that in this sport is practically forgettable - from conflicts within the leading structures, to the establishment of parallel alliances... Because of everything, the results stopped coming.
Female and male karate athletes traditionally win medals, a Nenad Dulović brought Montenegro the 13th medal from the European Championships with silver from Zadar a few days ago. What remains a minus of our karate is certainly that the results were absent when it was most important - at the moment when this sport was returned to the Olympic program during the Tokyo Games, so none of our competitors traveled to the capital of Japan.
Montenegrin volleyball players somehow came from the shadows to the European championships - three pies in a row, but they were far from serious stories there.
A big job for more than a decade was also done by a sailor Milivoj Dukić who will participate in the Olympic Games for the fourth time in Paris (Marseille, to be more precise), and three years ago in Tokyo, he was one step away from great success and reaching the finals.
One of the most beautiful stories is our Paralympian Filip Radovic - the phenomenal table tennis player from Cetinje has a bronze medal from the Paralympic Games in Tokyo 2021, but also two silvers and two bronzes from the European championships.
In addition to all of them, Montenegro has boxing talents such as the vice-champion of Europe Bojana Gojković or bronze Tamara Radunović i Tomislav Djinovic, great competitors in taekwondo, but all sports have in common that there is no systemic commitment from the state...
SPORTS SYSTEM A MIRROR OF STATE AND SOCIETY
Back to the beginning of the story - where is Montenegro 18 years later and why there are more reasons to worry now.
Some of them have already been mentioned, as well as the example of water polo and women's handball... After the golden years, there were occasional successes - the "sharks" world and European vice-champions, recently third on the continent, the "lionesses" bronze at the European Championships - but the general impression is that both are in decline.
For several championships, the water polo players have been unable to get past the quarter-finals, and the handball players will skip the Olympic Games after London, Rio de Janeiro and Tokyo.
It is practically the same in every other sport, and one fact is more than clear in the end: Montenegrin athletes have often produced much better results than they have the conditions for, and the sports system in our country is a general mirror of society - disordered and without vision.
Savić, Vučević, Jelena Dubljević
In addition to playing in the jersey of Montenegro, many athletes have made their country famous by performing for foreign clubs - before everyone else Stefan Savic, Nikola Vucevic i Jelena Dubljević.
One of the captains of the football team is the first player from our country after Dejan Savićević and Predrag Mijatović who played in the final of the Champions League - in the Atlético Madrid jersey, with which he won the Europa League, the European Super Cup and was the champion of Spain.
Nikola Vučević is a well-known name in the NBA, the strongest basketball league in the world, and what kind of mark he left there is best explained by his two appearances at the "All-Star" matches and the many numbers that stand next to his name.
His colleague under hoops, Jelena Dubljević, reached the top in the women's NBA, when she won the title with the LA Sparks.
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