Rajko Mitić
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Mitić arriving at Schiphol Airport on 8 October 1970 ahead of the Euro 1972 qualifying match versus the Netherlands
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| Personal information | ||||||||||||||||||
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| Date of birth | 19 November 1922 | |||||||||||||||||
| Place of birth | Dolac, Kingdom of SCS | |||||||||||||||||
| Date of death | 29 March 2008 (aged 85) | |||||||||||||||||
| Place of death | Belgrade, Serbia | |||||||||||||||||
| Playing position | Striker, Defender | |||||||||||||||||
| Youth career | ||||||||||||||||||
| 1937–1938 | Košutnjak | |||||||||||||||||
| Senior career* | ||||||||||||||||||
| Years | Team | Apps | (Gls) | |||||||||||||||
| 1938–1944 | BSK | |||||||||||||||||
| 1945–1957 | Red Star Belgrade | 572 | (262) | |||||||||||||||
| National team | ||||||||||||||||||
| 1946–1957 | Yugoslavia | 59 | (32) | |||||||||||||||
| Teams managed | ||||||||||||||||||
| 1960–1966 | Red Star Belgrade | |||||||||||||||||
| 1966–1970 | Yugoslavia | |||||||||||||||||
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Honours
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| * Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only. |
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Rajko Mitić (Serbian Cyrillic: Рајко Митић, IPA: [ˈrâːjko ˈmǐːtit͡ɕ]; November 19, 1922 – March 29, 2008) was a Serbian footballer, coach, executive and journalist.
Before becoming Red Star's the first successful player of the club, Mitić started his career in 1937 on the football fields of Košutnjak. In May 1938, he was transferred to BSK Belgrade where he played from 1938-1944. For BSK, he became a member of the junior team of the then-champion. Two years later, in 1940, he had his debut as a striker for the first team, where he scored two goals.
The Second World War halted his football development, but he continued playing in 1944 for the engineer squadron under which he fought along with fellow Yugoslav players Predrag Đajić and Jovan Jezerkić.
On March 4, 1945, when Red Star was founded, Rajko Mitić shortly became the captain of the team, and wore the red and white uniform for 14 seasons. In Red Star's uniform, he scored 262 goals in 572 matches (31 of which were domestic league goals, while the other 11 came in National Cup matches. He was a decent goal-scorer at Red Star, and became known by people in the local towns. His popularity in the early fifties was only by those in local towns, and surpassed that of other players. He was known as the memorable Red Star captain.
As captain and leader of the team, he won five championships (1951, 1953, 1956, 1957 and 1959) and four National Cups (1948, 1949, 1950 and 1958). One of his fondest memories was the first championship title, won in a dramatic finish, when the first place Dinamo lost their lead by slipping in the last three rounds. This allowed Red Star to win with a better goal ratio of 0.018 goals. A great achievement in the career of Rajko Mitić, according to him, was winning the National Cup three times in a row. He almost never missed a game, except in 1947, when he had to go to rehabilitation after a knee meniscus operation.
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