'He was our best player'

'Our best player'
Bulatovic, his association's general secretary, was described as "our best player" by his colleague Dragan Stojkovic, the FSSCG president. In a moving tribute, Stojkovic said: "We have lost our best player. Branko was the attacker, midfield player, defender and goalkeeper when necessary.

No1
"I knew him for a long time, from when I was a child. He knew everything and problems were an unknown word for him. This strength and will to work is something I have never seen in anybody else. I've had the opportunity to meet star players and top football officials, but our Branko Bulatovic was the No1."

Talented footballer
Bulatovic was born in Kolasin in 1951, the youngest of five children. He was a talented young footballer and in 1965, after his family moved to Podgorica, the capital of Montenegro, he began training with FK Buducnost.

Law at university
He spent three seasons with the club's junior and Under-21 teams before choosing to concentrate on his studies, moving to Belgrade to read law at university. "My parents advised me to continue my education and I agreed," he later recalled. "I do not regret it - I stayed in football and this is what counts."

Football reporting
He would graduate from the Belgrade law school in 1976 but throughout his university years, football remained a constant in his life: he got a job covering the sport for the Podgorica daily newspaper Pobjeda. "When I got a job with Pobjeda, I told the editors that I could only write about football," he said.

General secretary
After graduating, he returned to Podgorica where he was recruited by his old club, Buducnost, to work as general secretary. At that time Buducnost had a crop of talented young players - notably Dejan Savicevic and Predrag Mijatovic - and it was Bulatovic who took care of them.

Savicevic recalls
He demanded excellence on the classroom and on the pitch, as Savicevic, now president of the Football Association of Montenegro (FSCG), recalled. "As a child he brought me to Buducnost and taught me about life and football," he said. "I would not have achieved such success in life if it were not for him."

Low point
In 1987 Bulatovic got a job at the Yugoslavian Football Association (FSJ) as a legal adviser. In 1991, the year of the break-up of Yugoslavia, he was elected general secretary, a position he would retain until his death. The following years were not easy. Bulatovic recalled the national team's expulsion from the 1992 UEFA European Championship - as a consequence of United Nations sanctions - as the low point.

No self-pity
"Not many people can really understand what we went through," he said. "Probably the worst moment was when the team was sent home from Sweden in 1992. Miljan Miljanic [now the FSSCG's honorary president] was the key figure at the time. He insisted that the game must go on and he forbade any self-pity. We continued doing everything to keep the competitions alive at all levels.

The correct way
"In hard political times we survived under enormous pressures. We did not praise Slobodan Milosevic or other politicians. We simply accepted the will of Serbia and Montenegro's voters. That's why we suffered huge financial problems, but we survived thanks to donations from UEFA and FIFA. This was the only correct way."

Olsson sends condolences
His loss has been felt around Europe. In a letter to Stojkovic, the UEFA Chief Executive Lars-Christer Olsson said: "On behalf of the UEFA President, the Executive Committee as well as on behalf of the entire European football family we should like to extend to your association our sincere condolences and sympathy." Bulatovic leaves a wife, Ljiljana, and two children.