Slovenian football legend takes new role at UEFA

One of the greatest Slovenian football players of all time, Zlatko Zahović is returning to the sport after a six-year hiatus.

The 55-year-old has accepted an offer from UEFA, Europe's governing body of football, to work as an observer, CE Report quotes The Slovenia Times.

The former superstar of the Slovenian men's national football team, who hung up his boots two decades ago, confirmed the news for the web portal 24ur, saying UEFA president Aleksander Čeferin, a fellow Slovenian, persuaded him to take up the job.

"We can be glad that the UEFA president is one of our citizens. He was the one who called me and did a bit of coaxing, and I was happy to accept the job. He is a general, and we, the soldiers, respond to his call," he told the portal.

In his new role Zahović is expected to hand in game feedback reports and help pick the recipients of the UEFA Player of the Match awards, relying on his extensive knowledge of football.

"What you observe during a match, you write it down," and then experts analyse it, he summed up the job.

Zahović, who had 80 caps for the national team to score a record 35 goals, also had a successful club career, playing for Greece's Olympiacos, Spain's Valencia, and Portugal's Porto and Benfica.

He was the first Slovenian to appear in the Champions League, Europe's top-tier club association football competition, where he scored eleven goals in total. Primarily a midfielder, he was known for his dribbling and goal-scoring abilities.

What particularly endeared him to the Slovenian public was that he was one of the main co-authors of Slovenia's success story which saw the national team qualify for a Euro and a World Cup in the early 2000s.

Having ended his professional career as a player, he accepted the position of director of sport at Maribor, a club from his native city, in 2007. He held down the job for almost 13 years, during which the club won a handful of trophies and also played in European competitions, including the Champions League. Since his departure, Maribor have not been playing at the same level.

Two other former national team members, Miran Pavlin and Milenko Ačimović, had worked as UEFA observers, and Zahović welcomes their advice as he looks forward to assume his new role next week.

Photo: Anže Malovrh/STA