Marked for Darius Lipsiuc
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Market27 Sep 2027
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what FAP Priboj can pretend not to have heard.
Player ratings27 Sep 2027
No sign of nerves from Andrej Vuletić at 21 — 7.70
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Andrej Vuletić did not need any: 7.70, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Match25 Sep 2027
Loznica left with the points after a 2‑3 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad27 Sep 2027
Stefan Marjanović and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout27 Sep 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Marko Knežević, and the manager let it.
Squad27 Sep 2027
Đorđe Glišović 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.
The dugout27 Sep 2027
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 2‑3 defeat, delivered by Ivan Rajkovic to a room that had heard them before.
The dugout27 Sep 2027
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
The dugout27 Sep 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Darius Lipsiuc's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Market20 Sep 2027
“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 The request is on a desk at FAP Priboj, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad20 Sep 2027
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Darius Lipsiuc is 22, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad20 Sep 2027
Marko Knežević 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.
Match18 Sep 2027
Jedinstvo Ub left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad20 Sep 2027
A row about effort at FAP Priboj
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Đorđe Glišović was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout20 Sep 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Đorđe Glišović, and the manager let it.
Squad20 Sep 2027
Too much change too quickly at FAP Priboj
8 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
The dugout20 Sep 2027
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Ivan Rajkovic after 0‑1, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Player ratings20 Sep 2027
Successful dribbles: 13. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad13 Sep 2027
Marko Knežević and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Player ratings13 Sep 2027
Successful dribbles: 19. 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.
Match11 Sep 2027
Zemun made FAP Priboj work for it, but the scoreboard read 1‑0 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Squad13 Sep 2027
Words at FAP Priboj training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Darius Lipsiuc 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.
The dugout13 Sep 2027
The manager makes an example of Darius Lipsiuc
“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.
Squad13 Sep 2027
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; FAP Priboj are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Player ratings13 Sep 2027
Nobody on the pitch touched Ayouba Kosiah
7.60, and no serious argument from anybody who was there. FAP Priboj had eleven men on the pitch and one of them decided how it went.
The dugout13 Sep 2027
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Ivan Rajkovic kept it short after the 1‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
Market13 Sep 2027
No place for Zhang Jiaqi in the plan
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Zhang Jiaqi has his answer from FAP Priboj; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market26 Jul 2027
“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.
The dugout26 Jul 2027
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” FAP Priboj have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Market26 Jul 2027
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Player ratings26 Jul 2027
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.38 for the rest of it.
Transfer targets26 Jul 2027
Everything agreed with Napredak, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Player ratings26 Jul 2027
Successful dribbles: 23. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Transfer targets26 Jul 2027
FAP Priboj offered $640.0K; Vojvodina 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.
Squad26 Jul 2027
Marko Knežević 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.
Boardroom26 Jul 2027
2 academy graduates step up at FAP Priboj
Senior shirt numbers handed to boys the coaches have known since they were twelve. Most will not make it and all of them have already done the hard part.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad25 Jan 2027
There were 6 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Squad25 Jan 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at FAP Priboj this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad25 Jan 2027
A row about effort at FAP Priboj
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Gastón Gerzel was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Transfer targets25 Jan 2027
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.
The dugout25 Jan 2027
David Pătru gets it from the manager
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
The dugout25 Jan 2027
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Danilo Đulčić will call it something else in private.
Loan watch25 Jan 2027
“I watch every FAP Priboj game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Borac Čačak runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Squad25 Jan 2027
The formation has left Darius Lipsiuc behind
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. FAP Priboj will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
The dugout25 Jan 2027
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.” Ivan Rajkovic chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Player ratings18 Jan 2027
A brace, and Martin Anđelković takes the afternoon — 8.72
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Martin Anđelković provided it, and the 8.72 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
The dugout18 Jan 2027
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Squad18 Jan 2027
A move Darius Lipsiuc would have made for nothing
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Darius Lipsiuc is living that version at FAP Priboj, and it tends to show in the first month.
Match16 Jan 2027
The drought breaks for FAP Priboj
7 without a win is the sort of run that changes how a town talks about its club, and Mačva Šabac were the afternoon it stopped. Nothing is fixed by one result and everything feels different by one.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Marko Knežević 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.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Words at FAP Priboj training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gastón Gerzel 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.
Transfer targets18 Jan 2027
FAP Priboj asked and IMT said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
The terraces18 Jan 2027
At 21 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.
Match16 Jan 2027
Three points for FAP Priboj, 2‑0 the final word against Mačva Šabac in a contest settled by the finer margins.