“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Mura can pretend not to have heard.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Mura have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Boardroom1 Feb 2027
Mura close the window on a squad of their own making
1 in and 2 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.
The interest is real enough to have reached print. Mura have said nothing, which in a transfer window is its own kind of answer.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Nino Marcelli falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mura this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
He is doing things on a Saturday afternoon that nobody around him can answer, which is flattering for about one season and a problem after that. Mura will not keep him by pretending otherwise.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Mura can pretend not to have heard.
The offer from NK Celje for Robert Čakš was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
The deal with Slovan Bratislava is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Rostov keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
The paperwork is done long before the player is. Luka Dovžan Karahodžić has agreed terms to come here when his current deal runs out, which means Mura have spent a summer's transfer budget on a phone call.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Radomlje have kept their man, and Mura go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Ivan Borna Jelić Balta was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Mura, and it is not being withdrawn.
There are footballers who have a good season and footballers a season is remembered for, and the second kind get their names read out in a hall in the summer. Mura will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
Ivan Borna Jelić Balta and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Ivan Borna Jelić Balta was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
4 goals in 14 games at Lucko — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Mura updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
Ivan Borna Jelić Balta and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Luka Bobičanec was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Matija Boben has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.
The hardest thing about being 19 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Kenan Kurtović did not need any: 7.60, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Ivan Borna Jelić Balta was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Successful dribbles: 16. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The dugout30 Nov 2026
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Tomas Lovric chose the glass-half-full version of 1‑1; the supporters left with the other one.
At 19 he is being measured against the rest of the division's kids and coming out in front. The senior version of this award is where the club would like this to lead.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against NK Maribor in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
In brief
The dugoutRaphael Hofer asks for a word with the manager
The words a physio says slowly. 27 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Mura, and both men came out saying it was fine.
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
Niko Kasalo has done the arithmetic and does not like the answer. Nothing corrodes a squad faster, and no club has ever solved it by explaining the wage structure to a footballer.
34 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Mura lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Successful dribbles: 25. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Ivan Borna Jelić Balta and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
A mark of 7.35, and nobody in the ground would argue with it. He was involved in everything that mattered and most of what did not.
The dugout9 Nov 2026
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Tomas Lovric chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
Nobody at Mura will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
The crowd waited for a goal that never came. Aluminij defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
42 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Mura lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Koper go through and Mura go home, 0‑1 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Šimun Butić did not need any: 7.91, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Matija Boben and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
At 23 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Four or five weekends of consistency, measured against everybody else in the division. A quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
The dugout2 Nov 2026
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Tomas Lovric, on a 2‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
The words a physio says slowly. 50 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
He is 23 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Tomas Lovric on a 1‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
Ivan Borna Jelić Balta and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against NK Celje in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Vanja Kulenović signs something — a contract at Mura or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Position 6 on 12 points, and the places that carry a European ticket are close enough to count. Seasons like this are decided by two results in April, and the club knows which two.
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one Mura will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Luka Turudija has written the date down.
7.93, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
Ivan Borna Jelić Balta was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
At 23 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
At 19 he was better than everybody his age in the division for four weeks running, which is harder than one good afternoon. Mura will try not to make too much of it.
Position 6, 12 points, and every result so far reduced to one line. The second half of the season starts with the same squad and a different set of expectations.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Luka Bobičanec is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Squad5 Oct 2026
10 new faces, and Mura are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Kenan Kurtović provided it, and the 8.62 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Luka Kolar has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Tomas Lovric on a 2‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Jaka Zrnec had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 16 arrived, 7 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
Mura offered $1.3M; Aluminij said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Hajduk Split is saying, and nobody at Mura is enjoying the guessing.
Add another name to the list: Lucko have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Martin Magister. The answer from Mura has not changed — yet.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Luka Bobičanec was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad7 Sep 2026
10 new faces, and Mura are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Vanja Kulenović is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Mura can pretend not to have heard.
$1.2M on the table at Aluminij. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Mura had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at RWDM, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mura this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
The dugout31 Aug 2026
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Tomas Lovric chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
“It was not right for me. I am not going to explain why to anybody except the people I owe an explanation to.” A deal agreed between two clubs, and a player who declined to be part of it.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $1.5M — a club that wants Alexander Stožinić enough to be asked twice.
It is the rarest sequence in football: supporters ask for something, and the club goes and does it. $660.0K for Luka Kolar, and for one week nobody is complaining about anything.
He is 23 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Martin Magister has, at Mura, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Ivan Borna Jelić Balta was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
49 months to run and not a word offered. A club that lets the calendar negotiate for it usually ends up losing to the calendar.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Edvin Krupić falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.