Dejan Petković

Radnički Niš

Petković's playing career started in 1988 at Radnički Niš. He became the youngest player ever to play an official match in the history of old Yugoslav First League, debuting on 25 September 1988 when he was 16 years and 15 days old, against Željezničar Sarajevo thus beating Mitar Mrkela's record by one day. Radnički ended up winning 4–0 in that match. Petković's age record has since been broken by Slavko Perović and Danijel Aleksić. Petković still helps his first club, which has since then declined.

Red Star Belgrade

In July 1992, Petković was bought by Red Star Belgrade. Though not even 20 years of age, he arrived with a reputation as a skilled technical playmaker. As established Yugoslav internationals such as Dejan Savićević, Darko Pančev, Vladimir Jugović, and Siniša Mihajlović left the club during the same summer, Petković was given a first-team run straight away by new head coach Milan Živadinović, appearing in 30 league matches and scoring 5 goals in his first season in Belgrade. He ended up staying with Red Star until December 1995 (three and a half seasons), winning one First League of FR Yugoslavia title and two FR Yugoslavia Cups. His transfer to Real Madrid was principally agreed during summer 1995, but Red Star decided to hang on to him for the 1995–96 UEFA Cup where the club expected to do well after finally being allowed back on the European scene following years of sporting sanctions due to regional conflicts. However, Red Star…

Petković started playing by SFR Yugoslavia youth teams when he was 15 years old. In that age, he even scored one of the fastest goals in football, after just three seconds in a match against Cyprus. He was later called to 1992 Toulon Tournament, alongside players like Savo Milošević, Zoran Mirković, Željko Cicović, Elvir Bolić, Spira Grujić, Mitko Stojkovski, Srđan Bajčetić, Miladin Bečanović, Igor Taševski, Sretko Vuksanović and Željko Tadić. His team made a runner-up campaign, in which Petković scored two goals in a 3–0 triumph over the United States (against players such as Brad Friedel, Claudio Reyna, Alexi Lalas and Cobi Jones). While still playing in that youth tournament, he received his first call up to the senior national team, being included for the UEFA Euro 1992 squad. Yugoslav coaches had already called eighteen from the twenty allowed players, without Croats, keeping some Macedonians, two Slovenes and just one Bosniak alongside the Serbs and Montenegrins. It was expected that the later two players would be Miroslav Đukić and Dragiša Binić, but Petković and Slobodan Krčmarević were included instead. Just one day after that 3–0 winning game against USA at the Toulon Tournament, played on May 27, Petković made his first appearance for the main Yugoslav team, an unofficial friendly against AC Fiorentina on May 28. He was even a starting player in the match - Omerović (Leković), Radinović (Novak), Petrić (Milanič), Dubajić; Mihajlović, Jugović, Brnović, Jokanović;…

He is considered one of the best foreign players to have played in Brazil, a great free and corner kicker and passer. In 2006 while playing for Fluminense, he scored a goal directly from a corner against Grêmio. In the next game, he scored another, but the ball hit the hand of a player from Fluminense and entered the goal; nonetheless, the officials counted it as one. Overall, he scored eight goals from corner kicks in his career, the last one on 8 November 2009 for Flamengo against Atlético Mineiro in the Brazilian Série A. He is currently the record holder for most goals from corners scored in football history.

Born to father Dobrivoje (traffic technician from Niš) and mother Milena (construction technician from Petrovac na Mlavi) who met in the small mining town of Majdanpek where they both arrived in search of work, young Dejan immediately took to football.