Bogdan Mircetic is a 19-year-old Serbian attacking midfielder who plays for FK Radnicki in the Serbian Superliga. Mircetic comes off a good professional debut season, in which he played 32 games, scored six times and assisted five times. The left footed player is also able to play on the right wing, a place he often moves into during his games. Mircetic is a three times Serbian U21 international.
Mircetic has an ectomorphic body build, with not a lot of muscles throughout his whole body. His legs are a bit bigger than his arms, and his body size is quite decent. Despite not having a lot of muscles, he looks quite well in duels. He tries to stick his leg in front of the opponent to recover possession, and if he is able to get his leg in, he will push the opponent away with his shoulder to get his body in front of him. He also uses his arms often, trying to slow down his opponent slightly by holding him a bit. Doing that, he can occasionally foul his opponent by holding him too long to just mistiming sticking in his leg and making the opponent trip. Standing at around 185 centimetres, Mircetic is a quite long player. However, he isn’t very good in the air. His jumping reach is not good, and he doesn’t look promising in aerial duels at all. He doesn’t even really look for them. He can read the ball trajectory, position himself and head well when he’s alone, but in a duel his timing and jumping reach isn’t competitive. His speed is quite good. The acceleration and top speed aren’t very special in particular but it’s decent. He turns really quickly and is agile as well. He has really good balance as well, also after contact. He can stay on his feet really easily, even when being in contact in a tight space in between defenders. Mircetic can also shield the ball from an opponent without difficulties. His reaction time could be improved, as he can sometimes react a bit too slow later in the game. And reacting for when he needs to receive the ball is also an issue, but not a major one. He can be frustrated with not getting a foul, or fouling when he thought it wasn’t one.
Mircetic is a great playmaker. He can dribble really well past opponent and keep possession in a tight space. He often uses the outside of his left foot when dribbling and regularly his weaker right foot. His first touch for low passes on the ground is really good, but controlling passes that go to his chest or leg height is worse. Mircetic likes to have the ball near his feet. He also often creates the counterattacks, from set pieces but also from normal defence. He can easily create chances, by running and dribbling past defenders but also by great passing into the box. He keeps his passes low, regularly into space behind the defending lines. His vision for low or diagonal chipped passes is really good. For passes behind defending lines he could just see a bit better if the teammate is in an offside position, but that’s the only big remark. He doesn’t often give long passes. They can be good if he and the teammate are open, but the passes are inconsistent when getting pressed or if his teammate is covered (switches up his power). Mircetic can regularly take the corners as well, but just like his crosses they aren’t really good. Sometimes they’re good, but in a total picture they’re too inconsistent throughout the games. He mostly shoots from distance, and his shots don’t have the best accuracy but they’re alright. Although he can give good power and curve to his shots, he can also miss really good opportunities. But it also talks a lot about his positioning in the box and positioning in general. He is often open, being mostly centrally positioned or a bit more to the right wing. He goes to the right wing if the centrum is too crowded or if the ball is there. Mircetic can also take penalties really good, scoring two out of two possible ones. He can fight with the ball until the end whistle, showing good fighting mentality.
Defensively he does a lot, despite playing at a more offensive position. He always fights for the ball defensively. Even if the result is good, and it’s almost the end of the game he’ll try to go into a physical duel and try to get the ball away from the opponent. He doesn’t always try and intercept passes though. He reads the game well when positioning defensively, and he only moves towards the passing lane if he’s sure to get the ball. He can also get as low as his own box to help his defence. If an opponent dribbles past Mircetic or is nearby him, he can track him back and press him. But if it’s on a different side of the field or far away from him he’ll reposition himself to a defensive position. If needed and positioned high, he can also press the backline together with the opponent and use his arms to help them press the other defenders. Mircetic can time a standing tackle quite well, he doesn’t foul very often by tackling or sliding (does that rarely) in general.
In my opinion, Mircetic is too good for Radnicki. He needs to move to a better team in his league or move outside of Serbia. His abilities offensively and defensively are quite well developed, and he deserves a move up. I think he has a top 5 league ceiling, as he is already a quite complete player at the age of 19. At the moment, a lot of teams could be interested in his services. From the Czech teams to the Belgian, Dutch, 2. Bundesliga or Austrian ones. Mircetic is definitely a very interesting player, that already plays at a good level above his team.
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