he was allowed to leave, Bican won championships in both his seasons with the Vienna club, but his heart was set on his family's homeland. During 1937, Bican left Vienna to join Czech club Slavia Prague. Bican was the top scorer in his first season, but Slavia finished as runner-up. The following season, in March 1939, Germany invaded Czechoslovakia and football split on similar lines, with Bohemian and Moravian clubs carrying their results from the Czechoslovak league into the new Bohemian-Moravian league. Bican was again the top scorer of the league but Sparta Prague, Slavia's greatest rival, won the championship again. The third year (1941), Bican's won his first of four Championships along with the third of 10 consecutive goalscoring accolades. He played for Slavia throughout World War II, while many of his football rivals were at war. During eight league seasons he scored 328 goals, including 57 in 26 matches one particular season (1943–44). During the 1939–40 season, he set a world record for the longest goal-scoring streak in a European top division when he scored at least one goal for 19 games in a row, netting a total of 47 goals over his run that included hat-tricks in 5 back-to-back league games. His record stood for 73 years until it was broken in 2013 by Lionel Messi (21 games in the Spanish league). Three times in his career, Bican scored seven goals in a game. In a 1939–40 league match against Zlín, Bican found the net seven times as Slavia ran out 10–1 winners. During the 1940–41 season, Bican matched his feat of the previous season, again against Zlín, scoring seven times, as Slavia won by a 12–1 scoreline. It was 1947–48 before Bican managed his third seven-goal match, as Slavia defeated České Budějovice in a game which finished 15–1. He was in the leagues that he played, the top-scorer 12 times during his 25-year professional career and Europe's and the world's top scorer in five consecutive seasons, from 1939–40 to 1943–44, a record that still stands. After the war several of Europe's big clubs were interested in signing Bican. Italian side Juventus were very keen and offered Bican handsome terms. He was advised that there was a big chance the Communists could take over in Italy, but what actually happened was the opposite. When the Communists came to power in Czechoslovakia in 1948, Bican refused to join