Zeliko Babic is officially on the Olympiakos bench. The “red and white” Amateurs announced the recruitment of the Croatian technician for the club’s handball team, to replace Nikos Grammatikos, who took up a position in the Academies.
The 52-year-old has previously enjoyed great success with his country’s national team and in the men’s Champions League.
In detail, the announcement:
“OLYMPIACOS SFP announces the start of its collaboration with Zeliko Babic. The Croatian coach (born 19/5/1972) takes over the technical leadership of the club’s handball team.
Željko Babic has great distinctions under his belt and vast experience at the highest level.
The 52-year-old coach has celebrated major honors with the Croatian national team, including four bronze medals at major events, at the London Olympics in 2012 and at the European Championships in Serbia the same year.
Also at the World Championship in Spain (2013) and the European Championship in Poland (2016), while he also won the silver medal at the Mediterranean Games in 2013. At the World Championship in France in 2017, Zeljko Babic won with the Croatian national team fourth place.
The Croatian coach also has experience from the EHF Champions League, having reached the round of 16 with Meshkov Brest, while with Gorenje Velenje he participated in the group stage. In fact, with Brest in Belarus he won two championships and two Cups in the two years 2013-15.
From 2020 to 2022, he worked at Pelister, with whom he won a North Macedonian Super Cup (2021-22), while his last team, before Olympiakos, was Croatian Podravka Koprivnica.
As an athlete, Zeljko Babic had a great career with many titles until 2006 when he retired and started coaching, with first experience from the bench at Balic-Metlicic (2007-08).
Zeliko Babic’s statement on olympiacossfp.gr: “I am very happy to be here, on behalf of Olympiakos. I know I’m coming to a great club! Now, we have a derby ahead of us. We all know how important it is, I hope we play well and win. I came here to win the league and continue our journey in Europe.
I am optimistic that I, my players and the entire staff will do everything to achieve our goals. In the first phase, our attention is focused on the match against AEK, then, step by step, we will deal with Europe and the rest of the games we have.”
Previous teams:
2007-08 RA Balic-Metlicic (Croatia)
2008-09 RK Metkovic (Croatia)
2009 RK Krsko (Slovenia)
2009-11 RK EMC Split (Croatia)
2010-13 Croatia National Team
2013-15 HC Meshkov Brest (Belarus)
2015-17 Croatia National Team
2017-18 RK Gorenje Velenje (Slovenia)
2020-22 RK Eurofarm Pelister (North Macedonia)
2022-23 RK Podravka Koprivnica (Croatia)
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