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The Club Scene: FMP Zeleznik
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It was an impressive scene in September when BC FMP presented its teams for the 2006-07 season. Almost 120 players were together, from the youngest youth team members to those of the senior ULEB Cup team. Journalists were left staring, however, at the junior team and its three teenagers taller than 2.20 meters. It will surprise no one if those youngsters one day become stars like so many players before them who started their careers in the Belgrade suburb of Zeleznik. BC FMP, a club founded in 1975 as the part of the machine factory Lola, is the only club to take part in each and every edition of the ULEB Cup since the competition started in 2002. And Factory Metal Products (FMP) has gone on to produce more than just cans. It has become one of the best basketball factories in all of Europe.
At the last World Championships in Japan, half of the Serbia and Montenegro national team had come through the basketball school in Zeleznik: Ognjen Askrabic (now playing for Lottomatica Roma), Goran Nikolic (Estudiantes), Bojan Popovic (Dynamo Moscow), Mile Ilic (New Jersey Nets), Marko Marinovic (Girona), and Branko Jorovic (FMP). The total might have been as many as 10, but Branko Cvetkovic suffered an injury practicing with the national team and Zoran Erceg was the 13th player on the Japan expedition, while Dejan Milojevic (Valencia) was injured and Vladmir Radmanovic (Los Angeles Lakers) decided to skip the tournament.
Each year the factory in Zeleznik produces a new model of players. When Milojevic and Radmanovic left FMP, "twin towers" Askrabic and Nikolic replaced them. The next generation boasted Ilic and Milan Majstorovic (now in Bilbao) together with Nikola Vasic (Alicante). They were replaced by Erceg and Cvetkovic, while European junior champions Dragan Teodosic and Dragan Labovic are getting their chance this season. New faces from the cadet national team like Macvan Covic and Dejan Musli are waiting in the wings. This factory is working day and night.
 When the club was founded some three decades ago, it competed in local Belgrade leagues playing outdoors. In 1986 FMP advanced to the top Serbian League, but that was the end of the story. The competition demanded an indoor home court and the club did not have enough money. As a result, it was disbanded.
Four years later Nebojsa Covic, one of the godfathers of Serbian basketball, breathed life into the club. Covic was the president of the FMP factory and was president of the national basketball federation for years. He built an arena in Zeleznik with 3,000 seats and found the right man to run the basketball operation in Ratko Radovanovic, a European basketball legend who won gold medals at various competitions with the Yugoslavian national team alongside greats like Kresimir Cosic, Drazen Dalipagic and Dragan Kicanovic.
Twenty years after it has been founded, FMP played for the first time in the top league of the domestic competition. In the 1995-96 season, FMP had highest attendance in the league. That year center Nikola Bulatovic played for the national team, becoming the first player to achieve such an honor in team history.
The next season FMP would win its first title. The run to the national cup started with Dejan Vukosavljevic hitting a triple at the buzzer to give his team a 72-73 win over Buducnost in the quarterfinals in Cacak. That sent FMP to the Final Four of the cup in Nis, where it overcame mighty Partizan 105-92 in the final. Forward Goran Boskovic was named game MVP and his jersey is now retired under the roof of the arena in Zeleznik. Several months later those two teams met again in the playoff finals, with Partizan taking revenge 3-1. The same result came a year later when FMP again reached the finals only to fall to Crvena Zvezda. FMP also reached the playoff finals in 2004, when it lost to Partizan in straight games.
 Its first international trophy came at the end of the 2002-03 season, when FMP beat Cibona in Zagreb in the Adriatic League final. Two years later, the team from Zeleznik won another domestic Cup, beating Partizan. Last season it won the Adriatic League for the second time, beating Partizan in final game in Sarajevo.
FMP was among teams that participated in the inaugural ULEB Cup season 2002-03. FMP won Group B with a 9-1 record, beating teams like Pamesa Valencia, Roseto, Pivovarna Lasko, Opel Skyliners and BC Ostende along the way. In the eighth-finals the victim was Generali from Trieste, but in the next round Joventut was too strong. Joventut won the first game in Badalona, 80-66, and even though FMP won the second leg 77-68, it was eliminated.
The following season a new sponsor came aboard and the team's name was changed to Reflex. The club won its regular season group once more and then managed to scrape by Joventut in a memorable second-leg, quarterfinal game in Badalona, which went to overtime only after Sasa Stefanovic drilled a half-court three-pointer as time expired. In the semifinals, center Kimani Ffriend was injured in the second leg in Israel and eventual champions Hapoel Jerusalem used that to score the victory and advance in Reflex's place. The team lost four in a row in the 2004-05 edition of the ULEB Cup to finish 5-5 and miss the elimination rounds for the first time. Last season FMP coasted through the regular season, going 7-3 record for second place in Group C. However it didn't have the answer for Asvel in the next round and lost in straight games.
 When that season started, no one seemed to give much of a chance to FMP's young team under coach Vlada Vukoicic. But during the season FMP unleashed a new generation of talented players including Ilic, Marinovic and Vasic. They all left the club over the summer, but new kids from the FMP basketball farmyard are always ready to compete with teams in the ULEB Cup and Adriatic League. Mladen Pantic, Erceg and Teodosic jumped into main roles and Branko Jorovic and Dusko Savanovic were expected to lead the way. However things went wrong at the beginning of the season as Jorovic suffered a back injury and Savanovic moved to Unics Kazan. But as usual, young replacements were ready. One of the most talented young power forwards in Europe in Labovic took over for Savanovic and versatile Bojan Krstovic took the leadership role from Jorovic. The oldest player on this season's roster is guard Slobodan Popovic, who is only 26.
There is no need for concern about FMP's future. Folks around Europe are talking about talented the 16-year-old Musli, among other stars in the making. Team president Radovanovic has scouts everywhere to find the best young talents for his team. Next to the FMP arena is a new hotel built for the players in 2000. There are 24 apartments and a restaurant that serves players from all selections in the club. Near the arena there is the unique Sports Basketball High School-College Belgrade. The school opened its doors in 2002. It fulfills the needs of students with special talent in sports. Basketball training and physical education classes are instructed by highly qualified teachers, coaches and sports experts. Students with full-board accommodation have comfortable twin bedroom apartments, which are all supervised by teachers, tutors and sports and medical experts. It's just another piece of the basketball factory that is working day and night in Zeleznik.
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Aca Ostojic, Belgrade
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