As the first in a series of articles focusing on young Canadian soccer players trying to make their way in Europe, this article is going to be focusing on 17-year-old Hamilton Ontario native Stefan Mitrovic, who is currently playing with Radniki Nis in the Serbian Superliga.
While growing up in Hamilton, Stefan got his start playing Recreational Soccer,later joining Hamilton Serbia U8s where he played for two seasons. He later joined other academies including Givova before settling on Empire Academy, staying there until his move to Serbia.
At the age of 16 he attended the CPL Got Game Trials where he had a decent trial, including scoring in the championship game. Unfortunately, he received no offers from CPL teams including his hometown club Forge FC, but he did enough to impress former Montreal Impact and now Coach of the NCAA Division 1 University Cleveland State Sinisa Ubiparipovic, who offered him a Scholarship. He made a verbal commitment to them, but that changed when some Serbian Scouts came calling; his dream was to play in Europe so he made the decision to obtain a Serbian passport and try his luck over there. While in Hamilton, Stefan grew up only 5 minutes away from Canadian National team and Red Star Belgrade goalkeeper Milan Borjan and is in the same age group of Hamilton native Theo Corbeanu who is with Wolverhampton Wolves Academy and recent Senior team Callup Jordan Nelson of Toronto FC.
Now in Serbia, he has impressed enough to make the first team at Radniki Nis and recently signed a 4-year deal which includes a 400 K release clause. The midfielder made his debut against Milan Borjan and Red Star Belgrade and on June 7, 2020 he scored his first goal against Rad Beograd. His team finished 5th in the league.
As far as playing Internationally, he does want to play for Canada but is also eligible to play for Serbia. He admits that unfortunately there has been no contact with the CSA and U20 coach Mauro Biello. Hopefully he will get a call-up to the U20s for Canada soon.
