Croatian football authorities yesterday rejected a request by AC Milan to leave Zvonimir Boban out of their squad travelling to Skopje for Saturday's Group Eight meeting with Macedonia.
AC Milan officials said they fear for the safety of Boban, one of Europe's most high-profile players, if he plays in the game. In 1990, before the disintegration of Yugoslavia, Croatia's most celebrated player, then with Dinamo Zagreb, became the focus of scenes of chaos which erupted during a league game with Red Star Belgrade, the establishment team among the Serbs.
When Red Star fans attacked Zagreb supporters, Boban attempted to intervene. For his troubles, he was attacked by a policeman. Soon the policeman was on the ground and Boban was kicking him around the pitch.
Soon, players, fans and policemen were involved in vicious fighting all over the stadium and on the streets outside. Afterwards Boban was forced into hiding for fear of reprisals.
Serbs form a significant 20 per cent of the Macedonian population, and, given Croatia's impassioned opposition to Yugoslavia's inclusion in the group, the Italian club believes that Boban could be the target for Serbian demonstrations expected at the game.
No less than Yugoslavia's visit to Dublin, the game is occasioning controversy, primarily because of the risk of Serbian action. As in the case of the Norwegian team travelling to Albania, NATO has undertaken to provide protection for the Croatians travelling through Serbian airspace.
No match tickets are being made available to Croatian supporters, on the basis that, because of the heavy military presence in Skopje, there is no accommodation available in the city. Irish fans will identify with that following the furore in the build-up to the postponed game against Macedonia in Skopje on March 31st. In a sense, it says it all about the chaos developing in what has come to be known as the Group of Hell.
Yugoslavia, debarred, for the moment at least, from playing in Belgrade, will stage their home game against Malta in Greece next Wednesday. But the Croatians will not agree to the venue, which they regard as a home from home for Yugoslavia, as a neutral ground for their re-arranged fixture with the Yugoslavs on August 18th.
Instead, they want the fixture to be staged in Switzerland, a non-NATO country which, they claim, meets all the requirements for a neutral venue. The Yugoslav response to that is likely to be a demand for the return game, scheduled for Zagreb on October 10th, to be taken out of Croatia. Faced with these kind of problems, UEFA, it seems, are determined to adhere as closely as possible to the original schedule on the basis that if they make one concession, they will be faced with demands for more. "Some people regard Group Eight as a la carte, picking when and where they will play," said a spokesman. "We have said before that this group must be seen in its totality if we are to finish on schedule. And just now, that is our priority."
"At the end of the day the Government made the right move, but I stress that at no point did we ask for the Yugoslavs to be removed from the competition. We merely said that this was not the right time to play the game." - Bernard O'Byrne
