Budimir: “We Balkans don’t feel comfortable in our comfort zone”

When he was six months old, his father died in a traffic accident, and at nine he had to flee the war with his mother and two sisters. They went to Croatia, where he grew up and trained to become a professional soccer player. Globetrotter with ten teams and five countries behind him, Ante Budimir (Ozimica, Bosnia, July 22, 1991) is one of the most special strikers in LaLiga. Osasuna’s top scorer for the last two seasons, today he is the main red threat in the visit to the Bernabéu. -You were not aware, but the first year of his life is a drama. -At nine months, three after my father died in a traffic accident, we fled from Ozimica to Velika Gorica, a city ten kilometers from Zagreb, because the Balkan War was already putting us in danger, but it is true that from then on my sisters and I were able to have a normal childhood. -What did it mean to live in Croatia? -Croatia and Bosnia are two different worlds. Croatia gives you many more opportunities and possibilities because Bosnia, despite being a European country, is a bit behind. Would you play football professionally in Bosnia? I do not think so. Surely he would be working in the fields, helping the family, instead of doing what he really wanted to do. In Croatia it is the other way around. -But you adore your country of birth. One thing does not remove the other? -I love Bosnia and I love Ozimica, where my grandmothers still live. They are 84 and 82 years old, they are phenomenal, I always go to see them in the summer and the rest of the year we talk on WhatsApp. We Bosnians who are Roman Catholics are also automatically Croats. In fact, my grandmothers can vote for the presidency of Croatia. Then there is the Bosnian who is Orthodox, who is automatically Serb, and the Muslim Bosnian is just Bosnian. I hope I have explained it correctly. -What did you learn from the war? -We have been in peace for 21 years and I hope there will be many more. I want to think that this is what we really learned. To live in peace and respect each other. I have been playing outside Croatia for seven years and in all the teams I have been I have had teammates from the former Yugoslavia with whom I have shared a magnificent relationship and I have not had a single problem. -Why are Balkan athletes so competitive? -We Balkans love sports and we love to compete. It’s in our blood. In the case of soccer players, which is what I know best, we are aware that to play in the elite we have to leave our countries. Playing in Croatia, or in Bosnia, helps you learn and improve, but we Balkans don’t feel comfortable in our comfort zone. A Balkan athlete knows that when he arrives in another country he may be taking a place from a player from that country, and to take it away he must show that he is better than him. That’s why, since you’re little and you play in the street, you try to be better than the brother, the neighbor or the friend you’re up against. Before Budimir, during the interview Eduardo Sanz -It is his third season in Pamplona, ​​where his two children were born. Yes, almost continuously. They are both Navarrese. Luckily, my mother has been here with us since the pandemic, helping us, and she has now been able to return to her house in Croatia to rest. She has earned it. -She took advantage of the pandemic to study economics. Is he already licensed? I have four subjects left. Due to covid, the University of Zagreb allowed me to study remotely and my sisters encouraged me to do so. They are older and have always helped me with my studies. They graduated in economics and told me that I could do it too. The pandemic seemed like the right opportunity. -As a future graduate in economics, what is your opinion about the price spiral in which the world has entered? -We, the soccer players, cannot complain, but you have friends and relatives who suffer, and a lot. The pandemic, the war in Ukraine, gas, electricity, inflation. It is a non stop. We all want to have hot food at home and go on the day off to watch something with your children or simply go to the movies. And it’s complicated. I don’t live in a bubble, I wonder how you can live with this price level and how people arrive at the end of the month. -How important is it for Osasuna that the club belongs to the members? -Our fans are the bosses of the club. That is already indicative of what kind of hobby it is and that is how it is transmitted in El Sadar. It shows that in their blood they only have Osasuna and we owe ourselves to them. -They do it with a project that already has four consecutive years in the First Division of good play and results. -We fight and compete to make a better Osasuna. There is a very good group and a good atmosphere. All this helps us to face matches with the best attitude and we are comfortable in this role. We have deserved to be in First and from this base we have to be ambitious and look as high as possible. -You are the most expensive signing in the club’s history and you have been Osasuna’s top scorer in the last two seasons: 11 goals in 2020-21 and eight in 21-22. Why is it that goals earn the most money? does it cost in soccer? -Is it easy to score a goal? No, it is not. There is no easy goal. No one is going to leave the ball for you to put it in the net and that’s it. It is true that there are certain functions in the field that are not appreciated and are key. Stay focused, don’t make mistakes that harm the team, run so that others shine… But the goals are what make the difference, the ones that fully impact the result. -Ancelotti says that Valverde and Rodrygo are examples of what a modern footballer is. Could we say the same about Benzema? -The two most modern and complete strikers out there are Benzema and Lewandowski, but note that they are 34-year-old players. In theory, if we talk about a modern center forward, we should talk about a young one, but they have been pioneers. Watch how Benzema presses, goes down to receive, associates, falls wide, finishes off in the area, assists, scores goals. When you do all this, you are a modern striker, and that is what Benzema is.