Boris Smiljanić

Grasshoppers

Smiljanić played his children's football with local club FC Neuenhof. During the summer of 1990 he moved to the youth department of FC Wettingen and in summer 1993 to the youth department of Grasshopper Club Zürich playing for their U-21 team. Towards the end of the 1994–95 league season he was called up into their first team for trials. He played in friendly games and had two appearances in the domestic league, as the team won the championship. Head coach Christian Gross then added Smiljanić permanently into the first team squad and used him as a substitute after a number of injuries in the squad and the team won the championship for the second time in succession. From the 1996–97 Nationalliga A season Smiljanić played as regular starter. He was eventually made captain of the GC team and he made over 200 appearances for the club winning five championships. During his time by GC, Smiljanić could not win the Swiss Cup. In 1995 they reached the final, but lost 4–2 against Sion. In 1999 they reached the final again, but this time lost 2–0 against Lausanne-Sport. In the 2001–02 season, GC had advanced to the final again. Here they played FC Basel. It came to extra time because the game had ended one goal a piece. In the 113th minute Basel's Scott Chipperfield played a high ball from the left, over goalie Fabrice Borer, which GC captain Smiljanic punched over the cross bar with his last effort, this because he assumed that Hervé Tum, who was positioned…

Although he was eligible to play for Croatia or Serbia, the countries of his parents, he chose to play for Switzerland, the country of his birth. He made his international debut in a 3–0 friendly defeat against the Czech Republic on 18 August 1999. He played two more games for Switzerland under Gilbert Gress, but when Enzo Trossero took over he was forced out of the squad. He made a shock return to the Switzerland squad in 2006.

After retiring in July 2012, Smiljanić began working as a youth coach for Grasshopper. He was promoted to manager for the reserve team (U-21 squad) for the 2014/15 season. He worked for the club until 24 August 2017, where he was appointed as the manager of FC Schaffhausen. Smiljanić was fired on 27 February 2019. On 31 December 2021, he was hired by then FC Basel head coach Patrick Rahmen as assistant coach. Following Rahmen's dismissal shortly after, on 21 February 2021, he asked for his contract with Basel to be cancelled for personal reasons. On 3 November 2022, he was announced as the new head coach of Swiss Challenge League side FC Aarau. At the time of his appointment, Aarau sat in sixth place with eight points deficit to a promotion spot. Despite winning eleven out of the 22 matches at the Aarau sideline (six draws, five losses) and managing to shrink the gap to the second place and promotion to four points, Aarau still ended in fourth place, narrowly missing a place in the promotion playoff. As a result, Smiljanić and FC Aarau agreed to end their collaboration at the end of the season.

Grasshopper Swiss Championship: 1994–95, 1995–96, 1997–98, 2000–01 Basel Swiss Super League: 2003–04, 2004–05 Swiss Cup: 2002-03, 2006-07