Red Star Belgrade - The Eternal Derby

The Eternal Derby

Red Star’s fiercest and long standing city rival is Partizan, the other large and popular sport society in Serbia. The clubs are also the most popular ones in Montenegro and Republika Srpska. They also have many supporters in all other former Yugoslavian republics and also in the Yugoslavian diaspora. The rival started immediately after the creation of the two clubs in 1945. Red Star was founded with close ties to the Interior ministry and Partizan as the football section of the Yugoslav People's Army. Since then, both clubs have been dominant in domestic football. The match is particularly noted for the passion of the Red Star’s supporters, called Delije, and Partizan’s supporters, the Grobari (English: Gravediggers or Undertakers). The stands of both teams feature fireworks, coloured confetti, flags, rolls of paper, torches, smoke, drums, giant posters and choreographies, used to create visual grandeur and apply psychological pressure on the visiting teams, hence the slogan "Welcome to Hellgrade". Some fans use sometimes also trumpets, similar to the supporters in South America. This creates for the region a typical and distinctive Balkan Brass Band atmosphere. Both sets of supporters sing passionate songs against their rivals, and the stadiums are known to bounce with the simultaneous jumping of the fans. There are many derbies in world football but very few compare to this, it is more than just game and has a deeper meaning. The duel is regarded as one of the greatest football rivalries in the world and the matches between these rivals have been labeled as the Eternal derby. Given its widespread touch on the entirety of a major city, it's dubbed one of, along with the Old Firm, the Rome derby and the Istanbul derby, the most heated rivalries in European football. In 2009, British Daily Mail ranked the Eternal derby 4th among the 10 greatest football rivalries of all time. The biggest attendance for a Red Star - Partizan match was about 108,000 spectators at the Red Star Stadium.