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Branko Strupar

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Branko Strupar
Personal information
Full name Branko Strupar
Date of birth (1970-02-09) 9 February 1970 (age 54)
Place of birth Zagreb, SFR Yugoslavia
Height 1.91 m (6 ft 3 in)
Position(s) Striker
Senior career*
Years Team Apps (Gls)
1989–1994 NK Špansko 137 (68)
1994–1999 Genk 168 (106)
1999–2003 Derby County 41 (16)
2003–2004 Dinamo Zagreb 13 (7)
Total 359 (197)
International career
1999–2002 Belgium 17 (5)
*Club domestic league appearances and goals, correct as of 13 February 2007

Branko Strupar (born 9 February 1970) is a former Croatian-Belgian football striker. In 1999, he became a naturalised Belgian. He consequently played for the Belgium national football team with whom he played 17 matches and scored 5 times.

Early career

Born in Zagreb and raised in Prečko (the west of Zagreb), the first club he played for was NK Špansko.

Career

Strupar played in Belgium for KRC Genk, winning promotion to the Belgian First Division in 1996 and becoming champion of Belgium with the same team in 1999. He also won the Belgian Golden Shoe as Player of the Year for 1998. In 1998, he finished as top scorer with 22 goals. He moved to Derby County in December 1999, where he most notably scored the first British league goal of the year 2000 after two minutes against Watford (a game in which he scored twice).[1] While at Derby Strupar gained popularity with his prolific scoring ability.

Despite an excellent goals-to-games ratio when fit, injuries curtailed his Derby career, and he was eventually given a free transfer,[2] with which he returned to Croatia for a brief spell at Dinamo Zagreb to wind up his career.

Personal life

Strupar lives in Prečko with his wife, daughters Dora and Laura and his son Bruno, born 16 March 2007. He was a sport commentator on the Croatian network RTL for Premier League broadcasts along with Filip Brkić.

Honours

Player

Racing Genk[3]

Dinamo Zagreb[4]

International

Belgium

Individual

References

  1. ^ "Super Strupar lifts Derby". BBC. 3 January 2000. Retrieved 7 June 2020.
  2. ^ "Derby release 10 players". BBC. 15 May 2003. Retrieved 7 June 2020.
  3. ^ Projects, Sanmax. "Algemene info | KRC Genk". www.krcgenk.be (in Dutch). Retrieved 8 November 2020.
  4. ^ "Fiche de Dinamo Zagreb : palmarès, calendrier, résultats et effectif - Football". L'Équipe (in French). Retrieved 8 November 2020.
  5. ^ FIFA.com. "Belgium honoured with the FIFA Fair Play Award". www.fifa.com. Retrieved 7 November 2020.
  6. ^ "Topscorer Eerste Klasse".
  7. ^ "Winnaars Gouden Schoen".


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