This article is contributed by Tarik Ajanovic:
Although Bosnian football is not renowned for its financial potential, recent developments have shown that there is some interest from potential investors, mainly in the area of real estate. For the past few weeks, there have been several meetings between the board of FK Željezničar Sarajevo, the current winner of the Bosnian Cup and one of the biggest Bosnian clubs, and the Slovenian company “Energoplan“ which already has some experience with these kinds of investments.
This article is contributed by Tarik Ajanovic:
Although Bosnian football is not renowned for its financial potential, recent developments have shown that there is some interest from potential investors, mainly in the area of real estate. For the past few weeks, there have been several meetings between the board of FK Željezničar Sarajevo, the current winner of the Bosnian Cup and one of the biggest Bosnian clubs, and the Slovenian company “Energoplan“ which already has some experience with these kinds of investments.
The story started in November of 2010 when the Slovenian company approached the club with an interesting plan offering to build a new stadium for the club in return for the land plot next to the current stadium, currently used as one of the club’s training grounds. Last week, there have been several new meetings where the plans were presented to the public and the local council. As it was presented, “Energoplan“ would lead the project by building a new stadium in the location of the current one and would extend it with a shopping centre on the location of the current training ground.
According to the plan, the new stadium would have a capacity from 20 to 24 thousand seats and the project would cost from 70 to 78 million Euros. The full complex would include the stadium, 650 parking spaces and 30 000 square meters of shopping space. The investors believe that they would return their investment by selling the space within the shopping centre with a profit rather than buying the land plot from the club and investing in the shopping mall by themselves. Shopping space would be priced at around 2000 Euros per square meter and the whole complex is located in a very attractive location in Sarajevo.
The proposed investment plan is as follows:
Stadium – 30 million Euros
Shopping centre – 28 million Euros
Garage – 6 million Euros
However, the plan proposes that Željezničar would have to invest 16 million Euros and both plots (the current stadium and one of the training pitches) while the rest would be covered by “Energoplan“. It could prove a stumbling block for Željezničar since that kind of money is almost 13 times bigger than their yearly budget. Željezničar recently earned around 1 million Euros from a percentage of Edin Džeko’s transfer from Wolfsburg to Man City since he started his career here and by selling a few players under 1 million Euros. Therefore, they have asked the city and cantonal authorities to help them with the project by investing the money on their behalf (it should be noted that all Bosnian clubs are registered as associations of citizens rather than being on the market as other European clubs, a practice that definitely needs to be changed).
On the other hand, “Energoplan“ already has experience with these kinds of investments, having been a part of 350 million investment in “Stožice Sports Park“ in Ljubljana, Slovenia which is the home of NK Olimpija and Slovenian national team. The complex also includes a multi-purpose indoor arena an underground garage and a shopping centre. This plan was also conducted as a public-private partnership between the City of Ljubljana and “Grep d.o.o.“ so “Energoplan“ hopes to strike a similar deal in Sarajevo.
The current ground of FK Željezničar Sarajevo, “Grbavica“, was built in 1953 in the neighborhood of the same name and went through major renovations in 1976 and 1986. However, the stadium was badly damaged during the Siege of Sarajevo by the Serbian forces from 1992 to 1996. The stadium itself was on the front line with a Serbian tank entrenched, part of the pitch mined and wooden terraces burned by the occupying Serbian forces. During the war it served as a symbol of resistance and a famous song “Grbavica“ by Mladen Vojičić-Tifa, the ex-Yugoslavian rock star and FK Željezničar Sarajevo supporter, promised the return to the occupied territory which finally happened in 1996.
Today, “Grbavica“ has been renovated with floodlights being completed only last year and has a capacity of 15 000. Still, it is far behind modern European stadiums and does not have a license for European matches and is only occasionally used for U-19 and U-21 matches by the Bosnian national team. The deconstruction of the stadium would cost around 350 000 Euros while the club claims that the current stadium and the training grounds are worth around 30 million Euros.
Although the fans remain skeptical about the whole issue and it is questionable whether or not the authorities can invest that kind of money, it will be interesting to follow the developments of this project in the following months.