Photos of the pitch at Kraljevica Stadium in Zaječar, ceremonially opened in 2023 by Aleksandar Vučić and Aleksander Čeferin, have sparked public outrage. Large sections of the field are completely destroyed.
Less than three years after its grand opening, the Kraljevica Stadium in Zaječar is back in the spotlight, but this time for all the wrong reasons. Photos from a second-tier Serbian football match between Bor and Napredak, played on Saturday, August 9, 2026, revealed a pitch in catastrophic condition. Large areas of the field are bare of grass, and the surface has drawn fierce reactions from the sports community and raised questions about the money spent.
The stadium was officially opened in November 2023, with Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić and Slovenian lawyer and football official Aleksander Čeferin in attendance. Milorad Dodik was also among the guests. On that occasion, it was highlighted that the facility was built to the highest UEFA standards and has a seating capacity of 8,168.
The construction cost of the stadium is a point of contention among sources. Tportal cites a figure of 28 million euros, while Dnevno.hr reports the cost was around 30 million euros. Regardless of the exact number, this is a multi-million-euro investment that, judging by the latest images, has been seriously called into question.
A post on the social media platform X has further fueled the debate. The author, Željko Pantić, directly called out Vučić and Čeferin, sparing no words. "In November 2023, the apolitical president of the UEFA mafia, Aleksander Čeferin, joined the pre-election campaign for the parliamentary elections and, together with Serbia's dictator, opened the Kraljevica Stadium in Zaječar. Not even three years have passed, and this love child of the UEFA mafia and Vučić's cartel really resembles Serbia. In normal countries, people go to prison for this," Pantić wrote.
The photos he shared show bare patches of dirt on the field, with a picture of a smiling Vučić from the stadium's opening in the background. The contrast between the pomp of that occasion and the current state has drawn numerous comments.
This is not the first issue with the stadium in Zaječar. As early as January 2025, cracking asphalt was reported on the access roads leading to the stadium. Earlier, questions were also raised about who would actually use the expensive facility.
Vučić himself was delighted at the 2023 opening. "This is Zaječar, you're not in London. Nobody believed when we laid the foundation stone in that rain. It looks amazing. Now we have four beautiful new stadiums-Zaječar, Loznica, Leskovac, TSC-and next are Niš, Kragujevac, Vojvodina, and then the National Stadium," he said at the time. Meanwhile, it has come to public attention that the national stadium in Surčin near Belgrade, his flagship project, is expected to cost around 960 million euros-nearly four times the originally planned 257 million euros.
The match between Bor and Napredak, which exposed the poor state of the pitch, ended with a 1:0 victory for the visitors. However, the result was completely overshadowed by the condition of the playing surface.
