Igor Matić

Igor Matić (Serbian Cyrillic: Игор Матић; born 22 July 1981) is a retired Serbian footballer who played as a deep-lying playmaker. He represented Serbia and Montenegro at the men's football tournament in the 2004 Summer Olympics.

Igor Matić
Personal information
Date of birth (1981-07-22) 22 July 1981
Place of birth Bugojno, SFR Yugoslavia
Height 1.76 m (5 ft 9 1⁄2 in)
Playing position(s) Midfielder
Senior career*
Years Team Apps (Gls)
1998–2003 Zemun 71 (11)
2003–2005 OFK Beograd 36 (11)
2005–2006 Caen 24 (2)
2008 Banat Zrenjanin 11 (0)
2008 Megasport 11 (0)
2009–2010 Grbalj 27 (9)
2010–2012 Mogren 43 (10)
2012 Napredak Kruševac 16 (3)
2012–2017 Čukarički 131 (24)
Total 370 (70)
National team
2002–2004 Serbia and Montenegro U21[1] 11 (3)
2004 Serbia and Montenegro Olympic 2 (0)
* Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only and correct as of 16 June 2017

Club career

Zemun

Matić began his senior football career with FK Zemun in 1998. As a 19-year-old, he was one of the players involved in Zemun's famous drive in the semifinals of the 1999-2000 Cup of Yugoslavia.[2] He played for Zemun until 2003.

OFK Beograd

Matić joined OFK Beograd from Zemun in 2003, and played alongside Branislav Ivanović in one of the strongest generations of OFK Beograd that decade. One highlight of Matić's spell at OFK was making the 2004 UEFA Intertoto semifinals before being eliminated by Atlético Madrid.

Mogren

Matić joined Mogren from Grbalj in 2010, where he would spend two years and amass 43 appearances and contribute with 10 goals. In January 2012, Matić sued Mogren in Montenegro's arbitrage court because he wasn't paid for over five months.[3]

Napredak

After leaving Mogren on a sour note, Matić joined Napredak Kruševac in January 2012, who had just hired Aleksandar Kristić as their coach.[4] This was an important factor in Matić choosing to join Napredak, as he and Kristić had known each other since he was at OFK Beograd, as Kristić was one of OFK's youth coaches at the time.[2]

Čukarički
"Čukarički is dangerous in set pieces because of Matić..."

Slaviša Stojanovič, Red Star coach in April 2014[5]

After only a half-season with Napredak, Matić quickly joined Čukarički, which was in 2012 the first privatized professional football club in Serbia. He would become Čukarički's playmaker and contribute to their promotion to the first-tier SuperLiga. In an October 2013 article titled "They are the 'oldies', everyone fears them", Serbia's Sportal named Matić in an 11-man selection of the best players over the age of 28 in the SuperLiga.[6] On March 18, 2015, he suffered a hamstring injury which sidelined him for two weeks.[7] After five years with Čukarički, Matić retired from playing football professionally in 2017.[8]

International career

Despite having born in Bugojno, SR Bosnia and Herzegovina, he opted to represent Serbia and Montenegr internationally. Matić was part of the Serbia and Montenegro national under-21 team that finished runners-up at the 2004 European Championship. He was also part of the Serbia and Montenegro team at the 2004 Summer Olympics.

Honours
Čukarički

Notes and references
  1. Only official UEFA matches included
  2. FK Napredak. "Igor Matić: 'U Napretku kao u Francuskoj'". Archived from the original on 14 July 2014.
  3. Archived 14 July 2014 at the Wayback Machine Perić, Dejan. Vijesti: Igor Matić: Nismo čuli nijednu iskrenu rečenicu sportskog direktora (in Serbian) 20 January 2012
  4. Archived 5 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine Perić, Dejan. Vijesti: Matić pojačava Napredak (in Serbian) 20 January 2012
  5. Mozzart Sport (author unknown). "Stojanović upozorava pred Čuku: Matić opasno centrira, štoperi dobro skaču".
  6. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 16 August 2014. Retrieved 3 July 2014.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) Sportal: Oni su "starci", a plaše ih se svi (in Serbian) 7 October 2013
  7. Sportske: Dobre vesti za Čuku - Vraća se kapiten! (in Serbian) 30 March 2015
  8. "Matić završio karijeru, postaje funkcioner Čukaričkog". mozzartsport.com (in Serbian). 16 June 2017. Retrieved 16 June 2017.
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