2017–18 Premier League of Bosnia and Herzegovina

The 2017–18 Premier League of Bosnia and Herzegovina, known as Liga 12^[1] and also known as BH Telecom Premier League for sponsorship reasons, was the eighteenth season of the Premier League of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the highest football league of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The season began on 22 July 2017 and concluded on 20 May 2018, with a winter break between early December 2017 and late February 2018.

Premijer liga

Season	2017–18
Dates	22 July 2017 – 20 May 2018
Champions	Zrinjski 6th Premier League title 6th Bosnian title
Relegated	Borac Vitez
Champions League	Zrinjski
Europa League	Željezničar Sarajevo Široki Brijeg
Matches played	108
Goals scored	260 (2.41 per match)
Top goalscorer	Miloš Filipović (16 goals)
← 2016–17 2018–19 →

Teams

A total of 12 teams will contest the league, including 10 sides from the 2016–17 season and two promoted from each of the second-level league.

Stadiums and locations

Borac	Čelik	Gabela	Krupa
Banja Luka City Stadium	Bilino Polje	Perica-Pero Pavlović	Krupa na Vrbasu
Capacity: 9,730	Capacity: 15,292	Capacity: 3,000	Capacity: 3,500
		[[File: |550px|alt=]]
Mladost	Čelik   Sloboda   Mladost   Radnik   Sarajevo   Široki Brijeg   Vitez   Zrinjski   Željezničar   Krupa   Borac   GOŠK class=notpageimage| Locations of the 2017–18 Premier League of BiH clubs		Radnik
Stadium Mladost Kakanj			Gradski Stadium (Bijeljina)
Capacity: 3,000			Capacity: 6,000
Sarajevo			Sloboda
Asim Ferhatović Hase			Tušanj
Capacity: 35,630			Capacity: 7,200
Široki Brijeg	Vitez	Zrinjski	Željezničar
Pecara	Gradski Stadium (Vitez)	HŠK Zrinjski Stadium	Grbavica
Capacity: 7,000	Capacity: 3,000	Capacity: 20,000	Capacity: 14,000

Personnel and kits

Note: Flags indicate national team as has been defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players and Managers may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

Team	Head coach	Captain	Kit manufacturer	Shirt sponsor
Borac	Darko Vojvodić	Mahir Karić	Diadora	Nova Banka
Čelik	Edin Prljača	Fenan Salčinović	Givova	Wwin
GOŠK	Feđa Dudić	-	no.1	—
Krupa	Slobodan Starčević	Aleksandar Vukotić	NAAI	BEMA
Mladost Doboj Kakanj	Edis Mulalić	Aladin Isaković	Joma	Kakanj Cement
Radnik	Mladen Žižović	Dino Beširević	Joma	Nektar
Sarajevo	Husref Musemić	Krste Velkoski	Nike	Turkish Airlines
Sloboda	Slavko Petrović	Amer Ordagić	NAAI	Wwin
Široki Brijeg	Goran Sablić	Jure Ivanković	Legea	Mepas
Vitez	Ivica Bonić	Ivan Livaja	Joma	tioil
Zrinjski	Blaž Slišković	Pero Stojkić	Macron	PPD
Željezničar	Admir Adžem	Vedran Kjosevski	Diadora	Ziraat Bank

Regular season

The season has a two-stage format. In the regular season, each of the 12 teams play home-and-away once, resulting in 22 games played each. The top six teams in the regular season qualify for the Championship round, the bottom six teams qualify for the Relegation round. Each team then plays home-and-away against the other teams within their own group, for an additional ten games played each, a season total of 32 games.

League table

Pos	Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Zrinjski Mostar	22	16	2	4	40	18	+22	50	Qualification for the Championship round
2	Željezničar Sarajevo	22	16	2	4	37	16	+21	50
3	Široki Brijeg	22	13	3	6	37	17	+20	42
4	Sarajevo	22	12	4	6	44	19	+25	40
5	Krupa	22	9	8	5	29	23	+6	35
6	Radnik Bijeljina	22	9	5	8	21	24	−3	32
7	Mladost Doboj Kakanj	22	7	8	7	29	28	+1	29	Qualification for the Relegation round
8	Borac Banja Luka	22	7	5	10	14	22	−8	26
9	GOŠK Gabela	22	7	3	12	22	30	−8	24
10	Sloboda Tuzla	22	5	6	11	18	25	−7	21
11	Čelik Zenica	22	4	1	17	17	54	−37	13
12	Vitez	22	1	5	16	9	41	−32	8

Source: Football Association of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Soccerway, UEFA
Rules for classification: 1) Points; 2) Goal difference; 3) Goals scored; 4) Head-to-head points; 5) Head-to-head goal difference; 6) Head-to-head away goals (only if two teams); 7) Head-to-head goals scored; 8) Goal difference; 9) Play-off. (Criteria 2 and 3 are not used to decide champion, UEFA competition qualification, or relegation)^[2]

Results

Home \ Away	BOR	ČEL	GAB	KRU	MDK	RAD	SAR	ŠB	SLO	VIT	ŽEL	ZRI
Borac Banja Luka	—	2–0	1–0	0–1	0–1	1–0	1–1	2–1	1–0	1–0	0–1	1–1
Čelik Zenica	1–0	—	2–0	0–2	0–3	3–0	0–2	1–4	2–2	1–0	0–3	1–3
GOŠK Gabela	0–1	3–2	—	0–1	2–2	0–1	0–2	2–1	2–0	2–0	0–1	0–2
Krupa	2–0	1–0	1–1	—	3–1	1–1	1–2	1–2	0–0	3–0	2–4	1–0
Mladost Doboj Kakanj	2–1	4–0	1–1	1–1	—	3–0	1–1	0–0	1–1	1–0	2–1	1–2
Radnik Bijeljina	3–0	3–1	3–1	0–0	0–0	—	1–4	1–0	1–0	2–0	0–2	2–1
Sarajevo	3–0	5–0	0–1	2–3	4–2	0–0	—	2–0	0–0	4–0	0–1	1–2
Široki Brijeg	2–0	4–0	3–0	1–1	3–1	1–0	2–1	—	2–0	1–0	1–2	2–1
Sloboda Tuzla	1–1	3–0	0–1	2–2	2–0	0–1	1–3	0–3	—	4–0	1–0	0–2
Vitez	0–0	2–0	0–3	1–1	2–2	0–0	0–3	1–4	0–1	—	1–1	2–3
Željezničar Sarajevo	2–1	3–1	3–1	4–1	2–0	3–2	2–1	0–0	1–0	1–0	—	0–1
Zrinjski Mostar	0–0	5–2	3–2	1–0	2–0	3–0	1–3	1–0	2–0	3–0	1–0	—

Source: Football Association of Bosnia and Herzegovina
Legend: Blue = home team win; Yellow = draw; Red = away team win.
For upcoming matches, an "a" indicates there is an article about the rivalry between the two participants.

Championship round

Table

Pos	Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Zrinjski Mostar (C)	32	21	6	5	58	30	+28	69	Qualification for the Champions League first qualifying round
2	Željezničar Sarajevo	32	19	6	7	49	30	+19	63	Qualification for the Europa League first qualifying round
3	Sarajevo	32	17	5	10	58	28	+30	56
4	Široki Brijeg	32	16	8	8	52	28	+24	56
5	Radnik Bijeljina	32	12	9	11	35	38	−3	45
6	Krupa	32	10	10	12	35	42	−7	40

Source: Football Association of Bosnia and Herzegovina, UEFA, Soccerway
Rules for classification: 1) Points; 2) Goal difference; 3) Goals scored; 4) Head-to-head points; 5) Head-to-head goal difference; 6) Head-to-head away goals (only if two teams); 7) Head-to-head goals scored; 8) Goal difference; 9) Play-off. (Criteria 2 and 3 are not used to decide champion, UEFA competition qualification, or relegation)^[3]
(C) Champions

Results

Home \ Away	KRU	RAD	SAR	SB	ZRI	ŽEL
Krupa	—	1–3	2–3	0–0	0–1	2–0
Radnik Bijeljina	1–1	—	1–0	3–3	1–2	1–0
Sarajevo	1–0	3–1	—	2–0	4–1	0–0
Široki Brijeg	5–0	1–1	1–0	—	0–0	3–1
Zrinjski Mostar	4–0	1–1	1–0	3–1	—	3–3
Željezničar Sarajevo	1–0	2–1	2–1	1–1	2–2	—

Source: Football Association of Bosnia and Herzegovina
Legend: Blue = home team win; Yellow = draw; Red = away team win.
For upcoming matches, an "a" indicates there is an article about the rivalry between the two participants.

Relegation round

Table

Pos	Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Relegation
7	GOŠK Gabela	32	13	6	13	32	36	−4	45
8	Mladost Doboj Kakanj	32	11	9	12	42	44	−2	42
9	Borac Banja Luka (R)	32	10	8	14	22	31	−9	38	Relegation to the Prva Liga RS
10	Sloboda Tuzla	32	9	9	14	31	34	−3	36
11	Čelik Zenica	32	8	4	20	30	61	−31	28
12	Vitez (R)	32	3	6	23	15	57	−42	15	Relegation to the Prva Liga FBiH

Source: Football Association of Bosnia and Herzegovina, UEFA, Soccerway
Rules for classification: 1) Points; 2) Goal difference; 3) Goals scored; 4) Head-to-head points; 5) Head-to-head goal difference; 6) Head-to-head away goals (only if two teams); 7) Head-to-head goals scored; 8) Goal difference; 9) Play-off. (Criteria 2 and 3 are not used to decide champion, UEFA competition qualification, or relegation)^[4]
(R) Relegated

Results

Home \ Away	BOR	ČEL	GAB	MDK	SLO	VIT
Borac Banja Luka	—	0–0	0–0	4–2	2–0	1–0
Čelik Zenica	1–1	—	2–0	2–1	0–2	0–1
GOŠK Gabela	1–0	1–0	—	1–0	0–0	1–1
Mladost Doboj Kakanj	2–0	0–3	1–2	—	1–1	1–0
Sloboda Tuzla	1–0	1–1	1–2	2–3	—	2–0
Vitez	2–0	0–4	1–2	1–2	0–3	—

Source: Football Association of Bosnia and Herzegovina
Legend: Blue = home team win; Yellow = draw; Red = away team win.
For upcoming matches, an "a" indicates there is an article about the rivalry between the two participants.

Licensing issues

All clubs in Bosnia and Herzegovina must have a license to compete in the Premier League of Bosnia and Herzegovina with the deadline this season being set May 7 for the First Degree commission. Five clubs did not get their licences for the first degree: Borac Banja Luka, Sloboda Tuzla, Čelik Zenica, Vitez and GOŠK Gabela.^[5] The Second Degree commission convened on May 24 and only approved Čelik before being abruptly cancelled and rescheduled for May 30.^[6] The commission approved all other clubs except for Borac, meaning that they would be relegated into the First League of the Republika Srpska. As Borac did not have the license but Čelik did, they were allowed to stay in the Premier League.^[7]

Borac attempted to solve the issues which caused the license removal, including removing the debt Borac owed to FK Džaja. Borac showed the evidence it showed regarding the payments to Džaja to UEFA, which will assist the Football Association of Bosnia and Herzegovina regarding the decision of whether or not Borac Banja Luka or Čelik Zenica will compete in the 2018–19 Premier League of Bosnia and Herzegovina.^[8] The debate over the licences also caused the draws for the next season to be rescheduled.^[9]

In a similar way, teams promoted from the First League of the Republika Srpska or First League of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina also need to get a license separated into First and Second Degree commissions, although their deadlines are moved to a later date. The winners of both leagues FK Sloga Simin Han (later known as Tuzla City) and FK Zvijezda 09 met with the First Degree commission on June 14, but only Sloga received their license. Zvijezda 09 will convene at a later date with the Second Degree commission.

Top goalscorers

Rank	Player	Club	Goals
1	Miloš Filipović	Zrinjski	16
2	Mersudin Ahmetović	Sarajevo	14
3	Nemanja Bilbija	Zrinjski	12
	Petar Kunić	Borac
	Luka Menalo	Široki Brijeg
	Krste Velkoski	Sarajevo
	Goran Zakarić	Željezničar
8	Dražen Bagarić	Široki Brijeg	7
	Haris Dilaver	Mladost Doboj Kakanj
	Nusmir Fajić	Krupa
	Haris Handžić	Zrinjski
	Nardin Mulahusejnović	GOŠK Gabela
	Stevo Nikolić	Čelik
	Vojo Ubiparip	Željezničar

References

1. . avaz.ba. Dnevni avaz. Archived from the original on 20 February 2018. Retrieved 14 June 2016.
2. . Scoresway. Archived from the original on 6 May 2018. Retrieved 22 July 2017.
3. . Scoresway. Archived from the original on 19 February 2018. Retrieved 22 July 2016.
4. . Scoresway. Archived from the original on 19 February 2018. Retrieved 22 July 2016.
5. "Pet klubova nije dobilo licencu za igranje Premijer lige BiH naredne sezone". Klix.ba (in Bosnian). Retrieved 2018-05-31.
6. "Prekinuta sjednica Drugostepene komisije za licenciranje". SportSport.ba (in Bosnian). Retrieved 2018-05-31.
7. "Čelik ostaje u Premijer ligi prema pravilniku za licenciranje". SportSport.ba (in Bosnian). Retrieved 2018-05-31.
8. ""Ko je ovo dopustio Borcu? Nelogično je, nadam se da će UEFA donijeti pravu odluku"". SportSport.ba (in Bosnian). Retrieved 2018-06-19.
9. Radenović, Vedran. "Zvijezda 09 bez licence za Bh. Telecom Premijer ligu". Nezavisne novine (in Serbian). Retrieved 2018-06-19.

External links

• Official website