Gino Gard, born Gino Gardassanich ( hr, Gardašanić); (November 26, 1922 – February 12, 2010) was a

soccer Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 players who primarily use their feet to propel the ball around a rectangular field called a pitch. The objective of the game is ...

goalkeeper In many team sports which involve scoring goals, the goalkeeper (sometimes termed goaltender, netminder, GK, goalie or keeper) is a designated player charged with directly preventing the opposing team from scoring by blocking or intercepting o ...

who was a member of the United States team at the

1950 FIFA World Cup The 1950 FIFA World Cup was the fourth edition of the FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial international football championship for senior men's national teams and held in Brazil from 24 June to 16 July 1950. The planned 1942 and 1946 World Cups were ...

. He was born in

Fiume Rijeka ( , , ; also known as Fiume hu, Fiume, it, Fiume ; local Chakavian: ''Reka''; german: Sankt Veit am Flaum; sl, Reka) is the principal seaport and the third-largest city in Croatia (after Zagreb and Split). It is located in Primor ...

Free State of Fiume The Free State of Fiume () was an independent free state that existed between 1920 and 1924. Its territory of comprised the city of Fiume (today Rijeka, Croatia) and rural areas to its north, with a corridor to its west connecting it to the K ...

and died in

Illinois Illinois ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolita ...

, United States.

Club career

Gardassanich began his career with

Fiumana Unione Sportiva Fiumana or U.S. Fiumana was an Italian football club based in the present-day Croatian city of Rijeka and the predecessor of HNK Rijeka. The club was active between 1926 and 1945, at the time when the city was part of the Kingdo ...

and

Reggina Reggina 1914 S.r.l., commonly referred to as Reggina, is an Italian football club based in Reggio Calabria. Founded in 1914, they currently play in Serie B, and play their home matches at the 27,763 seater Stadio Oreste Granillo. They are nic ...

. After World War II, he played with NK Kvarner in the

1946–47 Yugoslav First League The 1946–47 Yugoslav First League season was the first season of the First Federal League ( sh-Latn, Prva savezna liga), the top level association football competition of SFR Yugoslavia, which ended the six-year period in which national footbal ...

. In 1949, he moved to the United States, settling in Chicago. When he arrived, he changed his name to Gino Gard and joined Chicago Slovak of the

National Soccer League of Chicago The National Soccer League (Chicago), formed by the merger of the Chicago Soccer League and International Soccer Football League of Chicago in 1928, is a semi-professional U.S. soccer league which is the oldest continuously operating soccer leagu ...

. He played with Slovak until 1959. During that time, Gard and his teammates won multiple titles, including the league title in 1951, 1952 and 1954; and the 1951

Peel Cup The Peter J. Peel Challenge Cup, better known as the Peel Cup, was an open soccer competition that crowned the Illinois state champion until it was replaced by the Illinois Governor’s Cup in 1971. History Origins Peter Peel was born in 1866 in ...

. In 1953, it lost the

National Amateur Cup The National Amateur Cup, also known as the USASA Amateur Cup, is an American soccer competition open to all amateur teams affiliated with the United States Soccer Federation through United States Adult Soccer Association (USASA). In 1923, U.S ...

final to

Ponta Delgada S.C. Ponta Delgada Soccer Club, also referred to as Fall River Ponta Delgada, was a United States soccer club, based in Fall River, Massachusetts. The club was formed by members of the city’s Portuguese community and shared its name with Ponta Delg ...

Gard was named the NSLC goalkeeper of the year in 1950.

National team

Gard was selected to the U.S. roster for the

. He was the original choice as the starting goalkeeper, but never entered a game. Gard was inducted into the Illinois Hall of Fame in 1992 and the

National Soccer Hall of Fame The National Soccer Hall of Fame is a private, non-profit institution established in 1979 and currently located in Toyota Stadium in Frisco, Texas, a suburb of Dallas. The Hall of Fame honors soccer achievements in the United States. Induction ...

in 2002.

Honors

;Građanski Zagreb *

Independent State of Croatia The Independent State of Croatia ( sh, Nezavisna Država Hrvatska, NDH; german: Unabhängiger Staat Kroatien; it, Stato indipendente di Croazia) was a World War II-era puppet state of Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy (1922–1943), Fascist It ...

Championship: 1941 ;Chicago Slovak *

: 1951, 1952, 1954 ;Individual *NSLC Goalkeeper of the Year: 1950 *

*Illinois Hall of Fame

References

External links

National Soccer Hall of Fame profile

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gardassanich, Gino 1922 births 2010 deaths American soccer players Chicago Slovak players U.S. Fiumana players HŠK Građanski Zagreb players Italian emigrants to the United States National Soccer Hall of Fame members National Soccer League (Chicago) players Reggina 1914 players People from Rijeka Footballers from Rijeka HNK Orijent players HNK Rijeka players 1950 FIFA World Cup players Association football goalkeepers