Scrolling through the Champions League qualifying brackets, an unknown name may have jumped to you if you were looking for the challengers that will play against FC Sporting Braga. They are the Serbian Hungarians from Bačka Topola, a club from Vojvodina capable of an irresistible ascent through the sports categories, and have even government backing.
If you follow foreign policy even a little, you know that Viktor Orban has led Hungary since 2010 and his party also won last year’s elections. You may also know that the national-populist design of the Hungarian premier also contemplates a strong expansion at the football level, to the point of having built a small stadium-cathedral in the village of Felcsut, where Orban spent his childhood, for the FC Puskas Akademia. The stadium – which is called Pancho Arena – is the newer version of the Puskas Arena in Budapest, capable of taking 65,000 spectators and the field for the excellent national team coached by the Italian Marco Rossi. But the political-football propaganda plan does not stop at Hungary.
Hungarians are ethnic minorities in neighbouring countries and Orban, like Putin in Russia, has been quick to acknowledge their importance. And what better way to give them visibility than football? Yes, because if you didn’t know, there are several clubs outside Hungary that are directly funded by the Budapest government, with a cumulative figure of about 50 million a year. There are four main ones. In Slovenia it is FC Nafta, in Slovakia FC Dunajska Streda and in Romania FC Sepsis Gheorghe. All of these clubs have a fan base that often chants in Hungarian during matches, causing the wrath of opponents. Finally, in Serbia, it is FC Bačka Topola – Topolya in Magyar – a city of 15,000 inhabitants, known football-wise for being the birthplace of Dusan Tadic, who played for the club when he was a boy. Here, unlike the other three countries, there were no tensions; in fact, the Serbian government awarded them with golden points.
Although a small club, FC Backa Topola had spent several seasons in the 1980s in Yugoslavia’s 2nd league, then divided between the east and west of the country. After dark years in which the club was almost extinct and played only in junior leagues between 2003 and 2005, it got a fresh lease of life and was chosen in 2013 as the recipient of a Hungarian investment, taking the name TSC. A series of promotions followed, taking it in 2016, to the Serbian minor league, a championship the club won in 2019 by 7 points over the second-ranked club. As a newly promoted club, it faces its first season in the premier league without reverential fears. In that Covid-ridden summer in which the European qualifiers were played behind closed doors, TSC Bačka Topola went through one round in the conference against Petrocub Hincesti (2-0) and came close winning against Steaua Bucharest, losing only on penalties.
By that time the project was well underway and has withstood even such a dramatic event as the death of coach Zoltan Sabo from a heart attack in December 2020. In the following two seasons, the club placed 5th and 6th respectively, confirming the team’s status as a mid-to-high-ranking team. Up front, we witnessed the explosive emergence of Nenad Lukić, who scored 18 goals in the 2020/21 season and was transferred to FC Honved Budapest in the summer of 2021. At this point, the new stadium was also opened, a 4,500-seat gem with a real grass field, UEFA-approved and bearing the name of TSC Arena.
As of November 2021, the club has a new coach – Zarko Lazetic – brother of Nikola Lazetic whom we remember well in Italy as he played for Chievo, Como, Genoa and Turin. Everything is going well in itself, but it is in this last year that the club scored the greatest result. It was a horrendous year for FC Partizan, but a great one for Bačka Topola which finished second, and an impregnable FC Red Star that finished undefeated. Similarly, in the national cup, the Serbian-Hungarian club lost only to Red Star in the semifinals. This time, the season’s hero is very young, his name is Petar Ratkov, and he scored 13 goals despite being only 19 years old.
Red Bull Salzburg has already snapped him up for a whopping €5 million this summer, where it took him only 34′ to score at Altach in the league opener. Another young star is 20-year-old Miloš Pantović from FC Voždovac, also on the under-21 roster. Don’t think that the roster is made up only of very young players. There are in fact several experienced players such as fullback Cvetković (age 33) and centre-back Cvetinović (age 35), who played for Grasshoppers, Lens and even Yokohama F. Marinos (!).
Finally, the question arises: what are their chances of getting through the round? Granted that in any case, we will see them in the Europa League rounds, Artur Jorge’s Sporting Braga seems to be on another level. After years of highly lucrative disposals, the Minho club seems intent on holding on to its jewels, which go by the names of Ricardo Horta and Abel Ruiz – and attempting to qualify for the Champions League rounds. Never say never! Football is known for unexpected surprises.
(Taken from Facebook page Calcio da Dietro)