Sergej Barbarez all in with Bosnia-Herzegovina at

Imagine it. A neophyte coach, main a group for the first time at any aggressive stage, and it being a high-profile task on the most important of big levels.

A confident broadcaster, crucial and aggressive, having his bluff called, being invited to not just discuss about it, but to be about it: Walk the stroll, why don’t you?

A former participant — scorer, shooter — being challenged to step up and proper a itemizing ship while navigating politics and the push and pull of historical past and high hopes.

Imagine that man going: “Bet.”

As in, you betcha. As in, I’d wager on me.

Lakers followers, you’ve seen JJ Redick run this play in the NBA.

Bosnia and Herzegovina’s trustworthy — who comprised the vocal majority amidst the full home for Thursday’s 4-1 Group B loss to Switzerland at SoFi Stadium — are seeing supervisor Sergej Barbarez pull the same inconceivable stunt.

The 54-year-old Barbarez is Bosnia’s national soccer group’s fifth supervisor since 2022. He’s also a former national group captain turned skilled poker participant turned broadcaster whose flip teaching this group got here as a full shock.

He may be the most attention-grabbing man amidst a mass of most attention-grabbing males at the World Cup, and he has Bosnia back on two toes.

And he had them on equal footing Thursday until Switzerland scored the match’s first objective in the 74th minute.

“Maybe our start wasn’t that good,” Barbarez said through an interpreter. “But from the first cooling break until the goal, we were the better players, the better team.

“I don’t like self-pity,” he added. “I entered the dressing room and told them all that they have one hour to cheer up to lift their heads up.”

The loss to the Nineteenth-ranked Swiss was the first in six matches for Sixty fourth-ranked Bosnia, following six consecutive 1-1 or 0-0 attracts, including their 1-1 World Cup opener against host Canada.

They know they’ll have to win their next match Wednesday against Qatar for an alternative to attain the knockout stage: “It seemed,” Barbarez said, “from the very beginning that the last game would be the most important one, and it turns out it is.”

And they’ll be prepared, he said.

“It’s hurtful; it’s quite painful,” he said. “But this is my job, and trust me, I’ll make sure they will be fine ahead of the next game. We will try to remedy what happened.”

We’d count on to hear one thing related from Redick — whose poker face isn’t as good as Barbarez’s, whose small sigh and slight smile betrayed his only feelings during his postgame news convention Thursday.

(As for who wore it better: Barbarez pumping up Bosnian followers in all-black business apparel beats Redick’s all-black athleisure.)

Ahead of schedule and blissful to be right here, Bosnia is taking part in in the World Cup for the first time in 12 years. Playing onerous with home money.

Barbarez spent most of his 14-year skilled taking part in profession in the Bundesliga, scoring 105 targets for Borussia Dortmund, Hamburg and Bayer Leverkusen. When he retired, he obtained his teaching license but didn’t use it until 2024, taking a gamble on a different aggressive calling.

He performed poker professionally in Europe for a decade, made at least $143,000, according to Cardplayer.com, and reached two closing tables in the World Series of Poker.

He also grew to become an unabashed critic of the Football Assn. of Bosnia, which was churning through managers; three of them have been employed and fired within months. Beyond failing to qualify for the 2024 Euros, Barbarez admonished the affiliation’s management for its 2022 resolution to schedule friendlies with Russia soon after it was banned by FIFA and UEFA for invading Ukraine.

And then, in April 2024, he was launched as the national group supervisor.

“His energy and authority can be crucial factors in getting the national team back on track for success,” the president of the Football Federation Vico Zeljkovic told reporters.

Also key: “Personality,” Zeljkovic said.

Barbarez maintained from the outset that his objective was to qualify for the Euros in 2028 — and for his gamers to really feel proud carrying Bosnia’s blue, yellow and white.

On Thursday, his gamers felt it and so did 1000’s of followers who confirmed up at SoFi Stadium carrying those colours for a World Cup match. All of them, all in.

“They support us all over the world,” said Ermin Mahmić, who scored his facet’s only objective in the 93rd minute. “It’s not normal to be honest, and we’re very thankful for them.”

And certainly for Barbarez, who took a path not often traveled, keen to wager big on Bosnian soccer.