Predrag Djordjevic – Profession: Champion!

Imagine a thoroughbred racehorse galloping. Powerful, fast, imposing and invincible. The image alone is riveting as you can’t help but feel the majesty of the moment.

This is how an otherwise unassuming young Serbian player arrived in Greece in 1993 and became a legend of legends! It’s a story like a fairy tale about a football “racehorse” from Serbia who became

He spent practically his entire professional life at Olympiacos as the “captain of the captains”. Djordjevic, for those who were lucky enough to see him on the field, was likened to a thoroughbred horse galloping non-stop, just like the legendary Djole galloped on the pitches, ploughing mostly along the left side of the pitch. Djole linked his name with the great Piraeus team that ended the “barren” years and commenced an “empire” that emerged in 1997 and continues until today with only small interruptions.

Djordjevic’s profession was not merely football, but champion! It will be very difficult for anyone to surpass what the stately Djole achieved in the 13 years he played for Olympiacos. He won 12 championships (only recently was he surpassed by… AEK Athens with 13 championships), five Cups and a Super Cup, while he also experienced significant success in Europe, with qualification to the quarterfinals of the Champions League in 1999, major away victories in the competition and “dream nights” at the Georgios Karaiskakis Stadium before he retired on June 1, 2009 – quietly, just as he arrived in Greek football.

When the lights lowered as he was to say his last goodbye, the divs were telling: 492 appearances with Olympiacos in all competitions, 156 goals and 95 assists!

When Djole left his hometown, Kragujevac, for Red Star Belgrade as a youth, he could hardly have thought that now, at 53 years old, he would be a legend of Greece’s top team and one of the most important elite Clubs of European football. It’s even more extraordinary if you consider that it all started with a …lie. Predrag Djordjevic’s life and career would have been possibly much different if his agent at the time had not concocted an… untruth to send him from Red Star, amid the war in Serbia, to the southwest Greece city of Pyrgos and Paneliakos, which then played in the second division. Only on his second day in Greece did he realize he was headed for the lesser league, yet for some reason he magically stayed on, only to later begin making history for Olympiacos.

He obviously wasn’t an Olympiacos fan from a young age, as he was born and raised in Serbia. Yet what transpired then, recognizing his rare football talent, every other major club rushed to acquire him, Djole, as if he could see the future, chose Olympiacos. He said “no” to everyone, and especially to the then owner of AEK Athens, Michalis Trochanas, who at the time offered him three and a half times the money Olympiacos was offering. As Djordjevic himself has recounted, he felt he had to go to Olympiacos, which at the time was inaugurating the Dusan Bayevic era, with the noted coach on its bench, believing that if he succeeded in being part of the team’s comeback after nine long years without a title, he would go down in history.

“Panathinaikos had won the championship, AEK was playing the best football at the time, but Olympiacos was the team that was looking for a fresh start. I had given my word to Olympiacos and that’s where I saw a very big opportunity,” Djordjevic had said after his career was over.

When he put on the Olympiacos jersey in 1997, Djordjevic was signing a contract that would make history. Olympiacos threw off the “barren” years and started winning one championship after another. With Djole leading the way came the first Champions League success in 1999, as the European football world was mesmerized by the Serbian star.

He made Greece his second home, married a local woman and “tied” his knot for good with the big port city. And even though purchase offers were coming incessantly to Olympiacos’ head offices from top clubs such as Juventus, Manchester United, Lazio and Valencia, he continued with the Reds, loyal to the team that showcased his talent and with which he made history. As he would say years later, only the prospect of going to Valencia in the 1999-2000 season put him in a dilemma, but not for long.

He linked his name with the great Piraeus team that put an end to the “barren” years and started the “empire” that continued to this day

Over this incredible journey of 13 years with the Reds, Djordjevic experienced countless great moments. Twelve championships speak for themselves.

There were also difficult moments, especially in his first year with Olympiacos and after losing the one and only championship during his tenure.

“I can’t get used to not winning a championship, it’s weird for me,” he will say after his career is over, recalling the one season in his career when Olympiacos lost the title to Panathinaikos. There have been tough times in Europe, especially with the “curse” of away games losses in the Champions League, but as a key member of the 2007 squad he was part of the breakthrough, with great performances and goals in matches that have gone down in the club’s history.

At the twilight of his career, when the lights lowered as he was to say his last goodbye, the divs were telling: 492 appearances with Olympiacos in all competitions, 156 goals and 95 assists! He was the top foreign scorer for Olympiacos, the Club’s fourth top scorer of all time, the player with the most championships in Greece, first Olympiacos player in appearances in Europe.

Djole, who through Olympiacos reached the Serbian national team, played as a starter in the 2006 World Cup, overall recording a total of 16 appearances and one goal.