A giant coffee pot, a World Cup team, and a journey home

SANDY — Before Bosnia and Herzegovina’s training session Monday night at America First Field, there was only one thing anyone wanted to talk about.

The world’s largest coffee pot.

In 2004, Bosnian food and coffee company Vispak wanted to celebrate the country’s coffee culture in a big way.

So they commissioned Sarajevo coppersmith Nasir Jabucar to build a giant copper dzezva- the traditional pot used to make Bosnian coffee.

It sat outside the stadium gleaming in the afternoon sun. Fans posed for photos with it. Children craned their necks to stare at it. Volunteers poured cup after cup of Bosnian coffee while the smell drifted across the plaza.

Everyone had questions.

How much coffee did it hold? About 8,000 cups.

Was it really the biggest in the world? Yes, and they displayed the Guinness Book of World Records Certificate to prove it.

Could it actually brew coffee? Yes, both strong and delicious.

But Bosnian coffee isn’t really just about coffee. It’s about slowing down. It’s about gathering. It’s about family. It’s about sitting at the table a little longer than you had planned.

And on this sunny day in Utah, no story felt more at home than that of Real Salt Lake Performance Coach Amer Šašivarević.

Born in Munich, Germany, to Bosnian parents who fled the Bosnian War, Sasivarevic arrived in Utah as a child.

His parents had escaped a conflict that displaced millions and eventually settled in Salt Lake City, where Amer grew up playing soccer around the valley.

“My mom and dad are from the former Yugoslavia, from Bosnia and Herzegovina,” Sasivarevic said. “During the war, they escaped to Germany, where they had some family. That’s where I was born, along with my sister and some of my cousins.

“When I was about six years old, we moved to Salt Lake City.”

Soccer quickly became the family language.

Sasivarevic played youth soccer around the valley, starred at Olympus High, and eventually joined Real Salt Lake’s academy when it was based in Casa Grande, Arizona.

“Ever since I made that move, it really helped me continue my career in soccer,” he said. “From there, there was really no stopping.”

At least, that was the plan.

He played at Grand Canyon University, was drafted by FC Dallas, and began a professional career that included a stint with Oklahoma City Energy.

Then came a knee injury. A couple surgeries later, his playing career was over.

“I came back home to be with my family and my girlfriend,” Sasivarevic said.

The girlfriend he came home to is now his wife. The two married last month.

“But there was something missing in my life.”

For years, soccer provided structure, adrenaline, and purpose.

Now? There was just a void.

Or at least that’s how it felt.

So Sasivarevic did something simple.

He reached out to Ryan Cotter in RSL’s performance department.

Cotter, now the Head of Performance for the Philadelphia Union, opened the door.

“I asked if I could come and intern,” Sasivarevic remembered.

He had earned his degree, and he just needed an opportunity.

There was just one problem. 

There were no open jobs. 

No internships. 

No salary.

“I told them I’d do it for free,” he said.

And he did.

He volunteered at the club he grew up supporting, learning the profession from the ground up.

The opportunity has become a career.

Today, Sasivarevic serves as a performance coach with Real Salt Lake’s first team, making sure players are physically ready to perform on Saturday and healthy enough to do it again the next week.

“It ended up paying off,” he said. “Especially because it’s my hometown club, a club I grew up rooting for. You take it with a little extra pride.”

That phrase — hometown club — carries a little extra meaning around Real Salt Lake, because the club has a habit of finding ways to keep its people around.

Šašivarević knows what it feels like to chase a dream at the academy level because he once chased the same one.

So for the academy players he now works with, Sasivarevic isn’t just another staff member.

He’s proof the path doesn’t always end where you think it will.

“Obviously, some of the kids are at a different level than I was,” he said, “but it gives you a foundation where you can say, ‘I’ve been in your shoes.’

“I think my words carry a little more value because of that.”

Especially during his time with the academy and Real Monarchs, Sasivarevic said his own experience helped him connect with players trying to navigate the same uncertainties he once faced.

“I think it’s super valuable,” he said.

That’s one reason RSL’s assistant sporting director Tony Beltran sees Sasivarevic as part of the club’s tradition.

“He’s such a top human,” Beltran told KSL. “Obviously he’s amazing at his job too, but he’s the kind of person we had to have inside the organization.”

Sasivarevic shook his head when told what Beltran said about him.

“I think it’s a testament to the values this club holds and the high standards it has,” he said. “I love Tony. He’s a top guy and he’s helped me a lot throughout my career, like Jason (Kreis) and Kurt (Schmid).

“It means the world to hear that.”

He uses that phrase a lot.

It means the world.

About the game. About his family. About Bosnia. About Utah.

And maybe that’s why Bosnia’s arrival here feels so special.

Bosnia and Herzegovina chose Salt Lake City as its World Cup training base.

The team trained at America First Field this week while thousands of Bosnian-Americans packed the stands.

Bosnia had come to him.

For Sasivarevic, it felt surreal.

“It’s something I never anticipated or expected in my lifetime,” he said, “to have our national team come train at the stadium where I work and at the club I work for.

“It means the world to me and to my family.”

His parents were there.

They’ve been there the whole time.

“When I was growing up playing, when I played in college, when I played professionally,” he said, “they’ve supported me my whole life. Now they get to watch me continue doing what I love. Hopefully I’ve made them proud.”

Outside, the line for coffee stretched down the plaza.

The giant copper pot kept pouring.

Asked what comes to mind when he thinks of Bosnia, Sasivarevic doesn’t mention soccer, or war, or the World Cup.

“Togetherness,” he said immediately.

Then he thought for another second.

“Togetherness and resiliency.”

And when asked who he thinks of when he smells Bosnian coffee?

He smiled.

“Probably both my grandmas,” he said. “They loved it.

“I drink it occasionally with my mom, so my grandmas and my mom.”

And on a summer day in Salt Lake City, as Bosnia prepared for a World Cup and the world’s largest coffee pot served thousands, Amer Šašivarević found himself exactly where he was supposed to be.

Home.