Croatia’s famed soccer coach Miroslav Blazevic, who led the nation to a 3rd place end on the 1998 World Cup, died on Wednesday, the nationwide soccer federation mentioned. He was 87. “The entire soccer household has misplaced ‘the coach of all coaches’ right this moment,” the federation wrote on social media. Blazevic died within the capital Zagreb after a protracted struggle with most cancers. Born on February 10, 1935, ‘Ciro’ Blazevic began his enjoying profession in his hometown of Travnik in neighbouring Bosnia.

Within the early Nineteen Sixties, he started teaching in Switzerland and moved in 1979 to Croatia, which was then a part of the previous Yugoslavia.

In Croatia, he took over Rijeka and later Dinamo Zagreb, the place he lead the membership to their first Yugoslav championship in 24 years.

“Dinamo’s 1982 win was the crown of my teaching profession,” Blazevic informed native media in 2021.

From 1994 to 2000, Blazevic coached the nationwide group and racked up quite a lot of spectacular wins, together with their third place end on the 1998 World Cup in France.

Eloquent and charismatic, Blazevic remained common all through the previous Yugoslavia lengthy after he retired in 2015.

As he battled most cancers again in Zagreb, Croatia’s present coach Zlatko Dalic devoted the group’s win within the third-place match on the World Cup in Qatar in December to Blazevic.

“That is for you boss. I can win 5 medals however you’ll at all times stay the ‘coach of all coaches’,” Dalic mentioned after Croatia beat Morocco.

(This story has not been edited by NDTV employees and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

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