Serbia

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Serbia’s FIFA World Ranking in 2018: 34th

Serbia national football (soccer) team at World Cup 2018

Racial stock of the Serbia-2018 World Cup team:
— 94% European ancestry [21.5/23.0], Dinaric/Pontid-Mediterranean predominant
— 4% Gypsy ancestry [1.0/23.0] (Marko Grujic)
— 2% Miscellaneous (possible minor component in several players) [0.5?/23.0]
— One Muslim player (Adem Ljajic); all others appear to be Christians, all or almost all of whom Orthodox.

For an in-depth, player-by-player racial-ancestry analysis, see below. For an analysis of the political significance of the racial-cultural dynamics seen in Serbia’s 2018 World Cup team, see here (below).

Race and Europe’s ‘National’ Teams, World Cup 2018

Introduction to Series of World Cup Posts

This year’s World Cup (June-July 2018), as a politicized sporting event, gives us the opportunity to reflect on the racial situation in Europe as it stands, as it has evolved over the past twenty years (using World Cup teams as fixed comparison points). The trajectory of changes in the racial stock of teams may point to wider racial prospects for the 2020s, 2030s, and beyond.

Rarely discussed in its own terms, but on millions (perhaps billions) of minds, is the fact that Western Europe’s World Cup squads of recent years have not been very European but are largely multi-racial teams, sometimes White-minority teams, and thus symbolically in line with Europe’s shakily reigning “Multicultacracy” ideology.

The goal of these posts is to quantify this year’s Western European national teams’ racial-ancestral(-cultural) origins in some depth. Which European teams are the ‘least’ and which are the ‘most’ European?

Are there political implications to the racial balance of World Cup national teams? I would propose that there are, as follows:

Some countries, notably France, have received criticism for being top-heavy with non-European ‘mercenary’ players, men of recognized individual talent but with oftentimes less-than-solid ties to, and often being resentful of, the country they are representing. Will such racial ‘mercenary’ teams overperform in 2018, as they would presumably be expected to if team play is a summation of individual talents, or underperform, perhaps due to a relative lack of national-patriotic feeling?

Europe’s World Cup 2018 teams analyzed so far:

— Belgium: 70% White, 22% Black, 17% Muslim
— Croatia: 100% White, no Muslims
— Denmark: 90% White/Scandinavian
— England: 63% White, No Muslims
— France: 33% White, African Majority
— Germany: 83% White, 11% Muslim
— Iceland: 100% White, 98% Icelandic
— Poland: 100% White, disproportionately from western Poland
— Portugal: 77% White, heavy African-colonial presence
— Russia: 84% White, 16% from Soviet periphery (Central Asia, Caucuses)
— Serbia: 94% White, 4% Muslim, 4% Gypsy? (This Post)
— Spain: 92% White
— Switzerland: 70% White, but only 44% White-Christian
— Sweden: 91% White, No Muslims

Player-by-Player Racial-Ancestral-Cultural Origins

(Method of classification: The twenty-three men on the SERBIA World Cup 2018 squad are individually evaluated by race, national-ancestral origin, birthplace, and place raised until adolescence, where such data is available. Players of half-White mixed race receive a 0.5 ‘White;’ two half-White players are thus together counted as 1.0 Whites.)

(Any corrections or additional information is welcome in the comments.)

Serbia 2018

Player years of birth range from 1983 to 1997.

GOALKEEPERS
[European ancestry at 3.0/3.0]

— Vladimir Stojkovic (White; born in Loznica, a town in Serbia’s Macva District near the Bosnian border; Macva has a considerable [95%] ethnic-Serb majority [and 1.6% Gypsy, 0.5% Muslim]; racial type appears to be Alpine with Dinaric influence typical of Serbia)
— Predrag Rajkovic (White; born in Negotin in Serbia’s eastern Bor District near the borders between Serbia, Romania and Bulgaria; home region in present day has an 11% Vlachs [Romanian] minority, historically more, and a present-day 78% ethnic-Serb majority; in terms of racial type, Rajkovic appears to have Baltid influence; see picture)
— Marko Dmitrovic (White; born in Subotica, North Backa District; home district’s primary ethnic group is Hungarian [see here], with first-languages split evenly between Hungarian and Serbian; Dmitrovic lived in Belgrade from at least age 14 for his football career; racial type is primarily European but may display some exotic influence, as in this picture)

DEFENDERS
[European ancestry at 8.0/8.0]

— Antonio Rukavina (White; born in Belgrade; surname is of noble origin, with tie-ins with the Austrian-Hapsburg Empire, Ukraine, and the Dalmatian coast of Croatia [see here]; by physical-anthropological type is primarily Alpinid with Dinaric influence, potentially Gorid)
— Dusko Tosic (White; born and raised in Zrenjanin, Vojvodina, Serbia; hometown has a 74% Serb majority with Hungarian [10%] and Gypsy [3%] minorities)
— Uros Spajic (White; born in Belgrade; Nordid influence; classifiable as North Pontid type with Dinaric influence; see picture)
— Branislav Ivanovic (White; born and raised in Sremska Mitrovica, Srem District of Serbia, a region with an 85% Serb majority; was a member of the Serbian Orthodox Church in London when he played for Chelsea, 2008–2017)
— Aleksandar Kolarov [Captain] (White; born in Belgrade; surname is Bulgarian origin; of Pontid-Mediterranean racial type)
— Milos Veljkovic (White; born in Basel, Switzerland, in 1995 to Serbian parents; has both Swiss and Serbian citizenship and originally played for a Swiss youth national team before switching to Serbia)
— Milan Rodic (White; born in 1991 in Drvar, a Bosnian Serb town and part of ethnic-Serb secessionist state that tried to gain independence from Bosnia in the 1990s [Republika Srpska] but is today within Bosnia; home town had a 95% Serb majority in Rodic’s year of birth, and lost most of its population to emigration during and after the Bosnian War of the 1990s; lived in Belgrade from at least the 2000s; displays both Pontid and Alpine characteristics and at times a hint of something exotic)
— Nikola Milenkovic (White; born and raised in Belgrade)

MIDFIELDERS
[European ancestry at 6.0/7.0] [Gypsies at 1.0/7.0] [One Muslim]

— Luka Milivojevic (White; born in Kragujevac, Sumadija District of central Serbia; home region has a very large [96%+] Serb majority; Dinaric racial type)
— Andrija Zivkovic (White; born in Nis, Serbia; hometown is nearly 95% Serb and up to 3% Gypsy; moved to Belgrade at age 13 for football career)
— Dusan Tadic (White; born in Backa Topola, Vojvodina, Serbia; hometown has a Hungarian majority and <30% Serb minority; his name suggests his family is primarily or all Serb origin; quite Dinaric in racial phenotype; see picture)
— Marko Grujic (Uncertain racial origin, possible Gypsy; see picture; born in Belgrade; phenotype suggests either Gypsy origin/admixture or something entirely non-local, more fitting in Turkey and more characteristic, given no other information, of a Muslim than a non-Gypsy Balkan Christian; may be a Turanid racial type or if Gypsy have even more distant racial origins) [=1.0 Gypsy, going on the strongly non-European phenotype]
— Sergej Milinkovic-Savic (White; born in Spain to Serbian athlete parents; father from Sanski Most, a mixed village in Bosnia with a 50-40-10 Serb-Muslim-Croat balance through the 1970s; ethnic cleaning in the 1990s emptied this city entirely of Serbs and today it is <2% Serb)
— Nemanja Matic (White; born in Sabac, Macva District of western Serbia with a very large Serb majority [95%]; has a Macedonian grandfather; displays Pontid or more likely North-Pontid and Dinarid features; see picture)
— Adem Ljajic (White; Muslim; born in Novi Pazar, the far south of Serbia adjacent to Kosovo and the only area in Serbia with a Muslim majority, but this is apparently only since the mid-20th century and is due to migration of Muslims at this time [the same cause as Kosovo’s Islamicization at the same time])

FORWARDS
[White ancestry at 5.0/5.0]

— Aleksandar Prijovic (White; born in Switzerland in 1990 to Serb parents; unclear ties to Serbia itself, as he has played for clubs across Europe but has never played for a Serbian club and so has unlikely spent much time in Serbia; member of Serbia national team from 2017; formerly on Switzerland national youth teams; phenotype is more Cro-Magnid than the Serbian average but also displays the typical Serbian PonticMediterranid-Dinarid tendency; see picture)
— Aleksandar Mitrovic (White; born in Smederevo, central Serbia, which has a 94%+ Serb majority and <3% Gypsy minority; Dinarid-Gorid type)
— Filip Kostic (White; born and raised in Kragujevac, Sumadija District of central Serbia through age 19; home region has a very large [96%+] Serb majority; Kostic has Mediterranean and Alpine racial influences; see picture)
— Nemanja Radonjic (White; born and raised in Nis, Serbia; hometown is nearly 95% Serb and up to 3% Gypsy; some pictures suggest some exotic ancestry is possible, as in this picture; may be of the eastern-Alpine Gorid type)
— Luka Jovic (White; Serbia’s youngest player this year, born in late 1997 near Bijeljina, in the Serbian section of Bosnia; lived in Belgrade from age eight, going through the youth program of a Belgrade football club)

Comparison with past SERBIA squads

2014

Serbia did not qualify for the World Cup in 2014.

2010

Serbia-2010 players were born between 1978 and 1989.

Racial-Ancestral Stock: Apparently all Serbian.

Serbia Record in 2010 World Cup
3: Games (finished at 23rd place)
2: Goals For
3: Goals Against
-0.33: Goal Differential per Game Played

2006

Serbia-2006 players were born between 1972 and 1984.

Racial-Ancestral Stock: Apparently all Serbian.

Serbia Record in 2006 World Cup
3: Games (finished at 32nd place)
2: Goals For
10: Goals Against
-2.7: Goal Differential per Game Played

2002

Serbia did not qualify for the World Cup in 2002.

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Analysis

Serbia has been a net exporter of people in recent decades (total pop.: 7.8 million in 1991; may be at 7.0 million in 2018, excluding Kosovo in both counts). This is exemplified here by the two players born in Switzerland (Milos Veljkovic and Aleksandar Prijovic).

The non-European influences on the team are minimal, with only one player definitely identifiable as non-European. This player (Marko Grujic) is of (most likely) Gypsy [Romani] ethnic origin. Few of us (if any) would, on first sight, place Marko Grujic in Christian-Europe; in a Western big city, most would assume him a Turk. Several other players (Marko Dmitrovic, Nemanja Radonjic, possibly Milan Rodic) have some wisp of possible exotic ancestry, an inference that comes and goes depending on which picture is looked at. Overall European ancestry approaches 95%.

The several players with connections to Bosnia also tells a story: The tragic racial-political story in Serbia since 1990. The United States and NATO shoved Serbia around in the 1990s and sliced off a portion of its territory to create a new Islamic quasi-NATO-dependency in Europe: The ‘nation’ of Kosovo. The Kosovo affair of the late 1990s was the tail-end of the dissolution of Yugoslavia, in which substantial ethnic cleansing occurred (i.e., the reordering ethnic lines to coincide with actual or desired political ones).

What is the lesson of Serbia? Serbs were 40% of the multi-cultural, multi-ethnic, multi-religious state of Yugoslavia, Muslims just under 10% and Gypsies under 1%, and the remaining 50% were mainly the titular nationalities of the successor states, like Slovenes and Croats. As of the 2010s, the much-smaller new Serbian state is nearly 85% Serb, 2% Muslim, and 2% Gypsy. The other Yugoslav successor states are likewise dominated by their titular nationalities.

The lesson of Serbia is that enforced multiculturalism will tend towards this kind of sorting (“ethnic cleansing”), and that at some point this century, Western European nations are likely to see the same kind of racial-political conflicts. The crime of our era is that our political leaders (one easy one to name is the disgraced and disgraceful Angela Merkel) have set the stage for this sad affair, early skirmishes of which we have certainly already seen.