Danilo “Dača” Ikodinović ( sr-cyrl, Данило Дача Икодиновић, born 4 October 1976) is a Serbian former professional

water polo Water polo is a competitive sport, competitive team sport played in water between two teams of seven players each. The game consists of four quarters in which the teams attempt to score goals by throwing the water polo ball, ball into the oppo ...

player who played on the bronze medal squad at the

2000 Summer Olympics The 2000 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the XXVII Olympiad, officially branded as Sydney 2000, and also known as the Games of the New Millennium, were an international multi-sport event held from 15 September to 1 October ...

(with

Yugoslavia , common_name = Yugoslavia , life_span = 1918–19921941–1945: World War II in Yugoslavia#Axis invasion and dismemberment of Yugoslavia, Axis occupation , p1 = Kingdom of SerbiaSerbia , flag_p ...

) and the silver medal squad at the

2004 Summer Olympics The 2004 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XXVIII Olympiad (), and officially branded as Athens 2004 (), were an international multi-sport event held from 13 to 29 August 2004 in Athens, Greece. The Games saw 10,625 athletes ...

(with

Serbia and Montenegro The State Union of Serbia and Montenegro or simply Serbia and Montenegro, known until 2003 as the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and commonly referred to as FR Yugoslavia (FRY) or simply Yugoslavia, was a country in Southeast Europe locate ...

). He received a Golden Badge, award for the best athlete in

Club career

He spent the 2005/06 season playing for VK Partizan. He appeared for the Serbian national water polo team in 304 matches, scoring 299 goals. In 2006, he appeared as a model in an underwear campaign for ExtremeIntimo. During the summer of 2006 he signed for Russian club Sintez Kazan. In his first season in

Sintez Kazan Sintez is a Russian professional water polo club from Kazan, Russia. The club was formed in 1974 and plays in Russia's highest division since 1993. Former Russian centar forward Andrey Belofastov is head coach. Accomplishments * Russian Wat ...

, Ikodinović led the team to 2006/07

LEN Cup The European Aquatics Euro Cup is the second-tier European water polo club competition run by the European Aquatics for those clubs who did not qualify for the European Aquatics Champions League. The cup was inaugurated in 1992. From 2024, afte ...

trophy as well as the Russian league title. In late March 2008, he reached an agreement with

PVK Jadran PVK Jadran is a professional water polo club based in Herceg Novi, Montenegro. As of 2021–22 season, the club competes in the Montenegrin League and Regional League A1. PVK Jadran is a 16-time winner of the National league (10 Montenegro, 2 S ...

to play for them in 2008/09 season.

Clubs he played for

* 1992–1998 VK Partizan * 1998–1999 ASN Catania * 1999–2001

AN Brescia Associazione Nuotatori Brescia (Swimmers Association Brescia) is an Italian sports club based in Brescia, that is interested exclusively in water sports like swimming and water polo. History The club founded in 1973 under the name ''"AN Bresci ...

* 2001–2005 Pro Recco * 2005–2006 VK Partizan * 2006–2008 Sintez * 2008–2009

Honours

Club

VK Partizan * National Championship of Yugoslavia (1): 1994–95 * National Cup of Yugoslavia (3): 1992–93, 1993–94, 1994–95 *

(1): 1997–98 Pro Recco * Serie A1 (1): 2001–02 * Trofeo del Giocatore (1): 2003 *

LEN Euroleague The European Aquatics Champions League is the top-tier European professional water polo club competition with teams from up to 18 countries. It is organized by the Ligue Européenne de Natation. The competition started in 1963 as European Cup. A ...

(1): 2002–03 * LEN Supercup (1): 2004 Sintez Kazan * National Championship of Russia (1): 2006–07 *

(1): 2006–07

Individual

* LEN Euroleague Final Four

MVP MVP most commonly refers to: * Most valuable player, an award, typically for the best performing player in a sport or competition * Minimum viable product, a concept for feature estimating used in business and engineering MVP may also refer to: ...

(1): 2003 Genova * Golden Badge (1): 2005

Politics

Ikodinović endorsed the

Serbian Progressive Party The Serbian Progressive Party (, SNS) is a major populist, catch-all party, catch-all List of political parties in Serbia, political party in Serbia. It has been the Ruling party, ruling party since 2012. Miloš Vučević, the former prime mi ...

(SNS) for the 2018 Belgrade City Assembly election, however, later he became a strong critic of SNS and its leader

Aleksandar Vučić Aleksandar Vučić, (born 5 March 1970) is a Serbian politician serving as President of Serbia since 2017. A founding member of the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS), he previously served as President of the SNS from 2012 to 2023, Deputy Prim ...

. On 17 March 2021, Ikodinović joined the People's Party (NS) and was appointed president of its Sports Committee.

Personal

In 2000, Ikodinović married his girlfriend Anja who later that year gave birth to their daughter Andrea. The couple divorced in 2003. For a few months during 2004, he dated professional

karate (; ; Okinawan language, Okinawan pronunciation: ), also , is a martial arts, martial art developed in the Ryukyu Kingdom. It developed from the Okinawan martial arts, indigenous Ryukyuan martial arts (called , "hand"; ''tī'' in Okinawan) un ...

fighter Snežana Perić. The relationship was high-profile with coverage in Serbian tabloids and lifestyle magazines. Later that year Ikodinović began a relationship with Serbian pop singer Nataša Bekvalac. Once the relationship became public on New Year's 2005 it inspired even more press coverage. In July 2006 the couple married in

Sremski Karlovci Sremski Karlovci ( sr-Cyrl, Сремски Карловци, ) is a town and municipality located in the South Bačka Districtautonomous province of Vojvodina, Serbia. It is situated on the banks of the Danube, from Novi Sad. According to the 202 ...

. They have a daughter named Hana who was born in March 2007 while Danilo was playing with the Serbia national team at the

World Championships A world championship is generally an international competition open to elite competitors from around the world, representing their nations, and winning such an event will be considered the highest or near highest achievement in the sport, game ...

in Melbourne. The couple divorced in January 2011. In 2013, thirty-six-year-old retired professional athlete Ikodinović started dating the active professional volleyball player

Maja Ognjenović Maja Ognjenović ( sr-Cyrl, Маја Огњеновић; born 6 August 1984) is a Serbian professional volleyball player of the Serbia women's national volleyball team and a two-time Olympic medalist. She is a five-time Olympian at the setter pos ...

, 8 years his junior. The couple married in late December 2016.

Motorcycle accident

On Friday, 27 June 2008, around 8:20pm, while riding his Yamaha R1

motorcycle A motorcycle (motorbike, bike; uni (if one-wheeled); trike (if three-wheeled); quad (if four-wheeled)) is a lightweight private 1-to-2 passenger personal motor vehicle Steering, steered by a Motorcycle handlebar, handlebar from a saddle-style ...

on the

Zrenjanin Zrenjanin ( sr-Cyrl, Зрењанин, ; ; ; ; ) is a List of cities in Serbia, city and the administrative center of the Central Banat District in the autonomous province of Vojvodina, Serbia. The city urban area has a population of 67,129 inh ...

Novi Sad Novi Sad ( sr-Cyrl, Нови Сад, ; #Name, see below for other names) is the List of cities in Serbia, second largest city in Serbia and the capital of the autonomous province of Vojvodina. It is located in the southern portion of the Pannoni ...

regional road, Ikodinović was involved in a

traffic accident A traffic collision, also known as a motor vehicle collision, or car crash, occurs when a vehicle collides with another vehicle, pedestrian, animal, road debris, or other moving or stationary obstruction, such as a tree, pole or building. Tr ...

near the town of

Kać Kać () is a suburban settlement of the city of Novi Sad, Serbia. The town had a population of 11,612 in the 2011 census. Name In Serbo-Croatian, the town is known as ''Kać'' or Каћ, in Hungarian as ''Káty'', and in German as ''Katsch''. ...

. The thirty-one-year-old professional water polo player was transferred to intensive care in Novi Sad where he got immediately taken in for surgery that ended up lasting almost eight hours. As a result, his condition was stabilized, but remained critical. Reportedly, of the numerous injuries he sustained, the heaviest trauma occurred on his right arm with severe tearing of

blood vessels Blood vessels are the tubular structures of a circulatory system that transport blood throughout many animals’ bodies. Blood vessels transport blood cells, nutrients, and oxygen to most of the tissues of a body. They also take waste an ...

(

nerve A nerve is an enclosed, cable-like bundle of nerve fibers (called axons). Nerves have historically been considered the basic units of the peripheral nervous system. A nerve provides a common pathway for the Electrochemistry, electrochemical nerv ...

s and

arteries An artery () is a blood vessel in humans and most other animals that takes oxygenated blood away from the heart in the systemic circulation to one or more parts of the body. Exceptions that carry deoxygenated blood are the pulmonary arteries in ...

). The next day, in the evening hours of 28 June 2008, almost twenty four hours following the accident, he underwent another

vascular Vascular can refer to: * blood vessels, the vascular system in animals * vascular tissue Vascular tissue is a complex transporting tissue, formed of more than one cell type, found in vascular plants. The primary components of vascular tissue ...

surgery on his arm. His condition has since improved. Investigation of the crash completed by mid November 2008, determining that Ikodinović had been driving at a speed of 173 km/h while having

blood alcohol content Blood alcohol content (BAC), also called blood alcohol concentration or blood alcohol level, is a measurement of alcohol intoxication used for legal or medical purposes. BAC is expressed as mass of alcohol per volume of blood. In US and many i ...

of over 2

per mil The phrase per mille () indicates parts per thousand. The associated symbol is , similar to a per cent sign but with an extra zero in the divisor. Major dictionaries do not agree on the spelling, giving other options of per mil, per mill, p ...

(considered to be the medium level of alcoholic intoxication) when he rear-ended the Yugo driven by Pajica Dejanović that had just begun overtaking a

tractor A tractor is an engineering vehicle specifically designed to deliver a high tractive effort (or torque) at slow speeds, for the purposes of hauling a Trailer (vehicle), trailer or machinery such as that used in agriculture, mining or constructio ...

vehicle driven by Miroslav Kukić. Ikodinović was charged with violating traffic safety. On 5 March 2009, his case went before a Novi Sad Municipal Court judge who ruled him guilty of causing the accident and ordered him to pay RSD70,000 (around

€ The euro sign () is the currency sign used for the euro, the official currency of the eurozone. The design was presented to the public by the European Commission on 12 December 1996. It consists of a stylized letter E (or epsilon), crossed by t ...

760 according to the exchange rate at the time). Ikodinović also received an eight-month ban on operating a motorcycle.Danilo Ikodinović: Sve ono o čemu sam ćutao..., ''Story'', June 2009
District public persecutor submitted an appeal on the court's decision due to not being satisfied with the amount of the fine. The damages part of the case was settled out of court on 26 May 2009, which is when Ikodinović paid a sum to Pajica Dejanović that was in some media outlets reported to be €6,000.

References

Serbian Olympic Committee

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Ikodinović, Danilo 1976 births Living people Serbian male water polo players Serbia and Montenegro male water polo players Yugoslav male water polo players Water polo players at the 2000 Summer Olympics Water polo players at the 2004 Summer Olympics European champions for Serbia and Montenegro Olympic water polo players for Serbia and Montenegro Olympic bronze medalists for Serbia and Montenegro Olympic silver medalists for Serbia and Montenegro Water polo players from Belgrade Olympic medalists in water polo Medalists at the 2004 Summer Olympics World Aquatics Championships medalists in water polo Medalists at the 2000 Summer Olympics European champions for Serbia Mediterranean Games gold medalists for Serbia and Montenegro Water polo players at the 1997 Mediterranean Games Mediterranean Games medalists in water polo Serbian expatriate water polo players Serbia and Montenegro expatriate sportspeople in Italy Serbian expatriate sportspeople in Russia Serbian expatriate sportspeople in Montenegro 21st-century Serbian sportsmen