Croatia's success in the World Cup divides Balkan neighbors

Whenever a big tournament comes along, we hear a familiar chorus in the region: "If Yugoslavia was a single country, imagine the incredible team we could have."

This lament nostalgic hides the fact that Croatia is doing well without Bosnian or Serbian players – and Yugoslavia, after all, has never reached the World Cup final.

If a man embodies football and the dream of a cultural Yugoslavia, it is Ivica Osim, the coach of the last Yugoslavia team before the country breaks violently.

He was in charge of a superb team at the 1990 World Cup in Italy which was eliminated in the quarterfinals. in a shootout by Diego Maradona Argentina

When Serb forces began bombarding the city, Osim, barely retaining tears, told Serbian journalists that he hoped that they would would remember "that I come from Sarajevo".

Now, the Bosnian watched Croatia and "They managed to integrate their individual qualities into the collective" and they never give up even when they are exhausted, he told the newspaper Jutarnji List, adding that ""

In a region still marked by the conflicts of the 1990s, during which 130,000 people died, many people find it difficult to support Croatia despite a common language and culture

. This is notably the case of Serbia, whose team did not manage to qualify for the World Cup.

In early June, a mini-world cup was organized for children attending Belgrade football schools.Each team wore the colors of one of the 32 qualified teams – with the exception of the team representing Croatia.To avoid offending the sensitivities Serbs, the children of this team were to wear blank white t-shirts

Novak Djokovic is Serbia's best-known sportsman and an idol in his country, but when the Grand Slam winner on 12 occasions has expressed his support For the World Cup Team world of Croatia, he was sentenced by Vladimir Djukanovic, a legislator of the ruling Serbian Progressive Party

"Only idiots can support Croatia, are you not ashamed of Novak?" Djukanovic tweeted.

His argument was that Djokovic enjoyed broad support from the Serbs in Krajina, a region of Croatia where Serbs were the majority before being driven out during the war.

Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic did not hide "I was supporting Russia, it's my right, Serbia is a democratic society and everyone has the right to support whoever he wants", declared Vucic

. This opinion is by no means shared by everyone. Many Serbs expressed their admiration, and sometimes even their total joy, at the success of Croatia

"Congratulations with all my heart, congratulations!" Said Wednesday Miodrag, a resident of Nis in southern Serbia . victory in the semifinal against England

"Our players and the federation (Serbian) could perhaps ask the Croatians to give us football lessons," commented Milojko Pantic, a well-known sports commentator while Yugoslavia was Always a single country, said that the Serbs with a sense of brotherhood had supported Croatia in the quarterfinals while those who wanted to see Russia beat Croatia were "bigots and nationalists"

In Macedonia , most The unwavering support of the nationalist right to Russia

"Congratulations to Croatia, politics, sport, region and the world gathered tonight", tweeted the Macedonian Prime Minister Zoran Zaev with a picture of himself. Croatian President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic at a NATO summit

"Politics aside, hat to you, neighbors! You are the pride of the former Yugoslavia", said an unidentified Montenegro on the website of the newspaper Vijesti: about 6,000 Croats live in Montenegro

The Bosnian Croats, where they represent 15% of the population, also supported Croatia.The Bosnian political analyst Zoran Kresic detected something deeper, saying that support "unified the region and Bosnia for the first time since the bloody wars."

He saw it as a "gradual warming of relations" between Croats, Bosnians and Serbs.