Dragons take first step onto world stage

Dragons take first step onto world stage

The BiH football team's qualification for the World Cup is an accomplishment that is resonating in the sports world and beyond.

"Dragons in heart, Dragons on the field," is the slogan that the Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) national football team has adopted as it plays in the 2014 World Cup in Brazil.

After several unsuccessful attempts, qualifying for the World Cup for the first time is a monumental achievement for the small nation. However, the Dragons have grander plans in mind.

"We are not going to Brazil simply as tourists or to take notes. We want to succeed and advance," BiH manager Safet Susic told reporters during preparations for the tournament.

More than half the BiH squad that will play in the country's first World Cup finals were born or raised abroad, children of some of the estimated 1 million citizens who escaped the 1990s conflict that claimed the lives of roughly 100,000 people and devastated the country.

Officials emphasised that building up this team was a difficult job, but at the end, they succeeded.

"This is a generation that created the game out of nothing," Milorad Sofrenic, a member of the executive board of BiH's Football Federation, told SETimes. ''BiH suffered a horrifying civil war only 20 years ago. In the past, there were always three sides. But now we have a perfect multi-national team in which there is a splendid atmosphere. The football association is functioning on the same principle."

Among what some are calling a "golden generation" of BiH players is one of the world's top strikers, Edin Dzeko of Manchester City in the English Premier League. After ravaging the German Bundesliga for 66 goals in 111 league games and...