Marked for Jakov Gurlica
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad21 Dec 2026
The medical room confirms 30 days on the sidelines for Nikola Vlajčić, and a plan built around him now has to be rebuilt.
Squad21 Dec 2026
Words at Lokomotiva Zagreb training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Marko Pajač 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.
Squad21 Dec 2026
16 days, the scan says, and scans are kinder than reality. The fixtures in that window have just become somebody else’s job.
The dugout21 Dec 2026
The manager makes an example of Mirko Sušak
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
The dugout21 Dec 2026
Jakov Gurlica gets picked when it counts
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Jakov Gurlica is on it.
Squad21 Dec 2026
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
Market21 Dec 2026
The Mirko Marić story refuses to die
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Mirko Marić signs something — a contract at Lokomotiva Zagreb or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Loan watch21 Dec 2026
16 appearances away from home and 4 goals to show for them. Every one of them makes next summer's conversation a little more expensive.
Loan watch21 Dec 2026
4 shut-outs in 14 games. A goalkeeper’s loan is judged on the afternoons when nothing happened at all, and Maksim Podliesnyi has been having a lot of them.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match14 Dec 2026
18 points, and a fixture list that is running out. The mathematics are not yet cruel, but they are no longer kind.
The dugout14 Dec 2026
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Lokomotiva Zagreb may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Match12 Dec 2026
4 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Squad14 Dec 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Lokomotiva Zagreb this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 Dec 2026
Juan Perea 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.
Player ratings14 Dec 2026
Ninety minutes of Mirko Marić at his very best
Marked 8.10. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Lokomotiva Zagreb.
Player ratings14 Dec 2026
Successful dribbles: 15. 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.
Match12 Dec 2026
It finished 1‑1, and it somehow always looked like it would. One of those afternoons where the table moves less than the tempers.
The dugout14 Dec 2026
Half-satisfied: Dino Erceg on the draw
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 1‑1, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Transfer targets7 Sep 2026
Everything agreed with Brondby, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Market7 Sep 2026
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Boardroom7 Sep 2026
Deadline passes with 4 signed and 7 gone
That is the business done at Lokomotiva Zagreb until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Marko Vešović 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.
Transfer targets7 Sep 2026
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Squad7 Sep 2026
“98 caps was 98 more than the boy who started ever expected.” At 34 he has stepped away from the national side and has not stepped away from Lokomotiva Zagreb.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Marko Pajač 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.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Mirko Marić is no longer first choice
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Mirko Marić 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 dugout7 Sep 2026
The manager makes an example of Jakov Gurlica
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.