“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 The request is on a desk at Uskok, and it is not being withdrawn.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Dinamo Zagreb is saying, and nobody at Uskok is enjoying the guessing.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Matko Zirdum was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Erik Lazaryan 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.
Uskok have made the call to Hajduk Split. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Uskok, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Ivan Bosančić will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Uskok the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Shahriar Yazdani has, at Uskok, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Tin Martić and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad28 May 2029
Matko Zirdum 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.
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Uskok is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
“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 The request is on a desk at Uskok, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Uskok this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Matko Zirdum was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The borrowing is past what the bank agreed, which is the line where a debt stops being how football is financed and starts being a problem. Every phone-in in this town will quote the figure for the next five years.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Matko Zirdum trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“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 Uskok, and it is not being withdrawn.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Matko Zirdum was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Every club pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time it has been tried.
“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; Uskok are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Matko Zirdum trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
3 months left, and both sides know what that means: every week without a signature, the fee Uskok could ask drops and the wages Josip Tarabarić can ask rise.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Antonio Knezevic has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
Position 14 and 31 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
Nothing has been announced and everybody understands what it means. A board that summons the whole football department on a Tuesday morning is a board that has stopped believing the problem will fix itself.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Uskok can pretend not to have heard.
Mate Pavlović 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.
This is money that keeps the lights on rather than money that buys a centre-half, and the difference is the whole story. A club funded by its owner rather than by its football has exactly one conversation left ahead of it.
The embargo bars a fee being paid for a player, whatever the manager thinks the squad needs. Every rumour printed about this club between now and its lifting is a rumour about a deal that cannot happen.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Josip Perišić was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
A change in the dugout is not one story, it is twenty-five of them. This is Tin Martić's: he was somebody's player, and now he has to be somebody else's, starting from nothing.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Uskok can pretend not to have heard.
Every club pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time it has been tried.
Squad16 Apr 2029
Josip Perišić 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.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Uskok know it.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Antonio Knezevic has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
The official line will be that it was routine. It was not routine, the timing says so, and every person in that room knows what the next bad result costs.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Ivan Bosančić will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Uskok the goodbyes have quietly begun.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Uskok can pretend not to have heard.
Mate Pavlović 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 shortfall was covered from upstairs again. Supporters are entitled to be relieved and entitled to ask what happens the month it is not, and both feelings usually arrive together.
Squad2 Apr 2029
Matko Zirdum 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.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Uskok know it.
Mate Pavlović and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad19 Mar 2029
Matko Zirdum 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.
Every club pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time it has been tried.
The board have said in public what they had been saying in private. Results between now and the next meeting decide it, and everybody in the building knows the arithmetic.
“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 Uskok, and it is not being withdrawn.
Marked 7.95 at 21, in a side that makes no allowances for age. He did not need any, and he looked the least nervous man on the pitch.
Boardroom5 Feb 2029
Uskok close the window on a squad of their own making
2 in and 3 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.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Lukas Nielsen is living that version at Uskok, and it tends to show in the first month.
This is money that keeps the lights on rather than money that buys a centre-half, and the difference is the whole story. A club funded by its owner rather than by its football has exactly one conversation left ahead of it.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Matko Zirdum was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Uskok will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Uskok can pretend not to have heard.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Petar Perko did not need any: 7.77, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Uskok this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Uskok asked and Lokomotiva Zagreb 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 embargo bars a fee being paid for a player, whatever the manager thinks the squad needs. Every rumour printed about this club between now and its lifting is a rumour about a deal that cannot happen.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Uskok know it.
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Uskok will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“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 Uskok, and it is not being withdrawn.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Petar Perko did not need any: 7.91, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Danijel Miškić scored, was marked 7.79, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
Tin Martić 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 Matko Zirdum was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Uskok will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Petar Perko did not need any: 7.65, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
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.
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Uskok can pretend not to have heard.
Every club pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time it has been tried.
Bruno Juranovic 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.
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Petar Perko did not need any: 7.60, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Tin Martić 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.
He is 21 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Marko Živković was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Player ratings9 Oct 2028
Roko Mavra was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.09. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
The borrowing is past what the bank agreed, which is the line where a debt stops being how football is financed and starts being a problem. Every phone-in in this town will quote the figure for the next five years.
8 without a win is the sort of run that changes how a town talks about its club, and Segesta were the afternoon it stopped. Nothing is fixed by one result and everything feels different by one.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Daniel Ola has just signed for Uskok, and for once the answer mattered.
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.
A 2‑0 win over Segesta, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Player ratings18 Sep 2028
Roko Mavra was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.22. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Marko Živković 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 hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Petar Perko did not need any: 7.67, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
5 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.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Uskok have done the hard part with Hajduk Split, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Cibalia is saying, and nobody at Uskok is enjoying the guessing.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Uskok this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
He is 21 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Uskok have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Mate Pavlović 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.
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.
The first defeat in 6 matches. The manager will say it had to come; the dressing room will say it did not have to come against Mladost Zdralovi; the supporters will say both, in that order, all week.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Marcelo Petkov has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Petar Perisic has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Tin Barisic is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
“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 Uskok, and it is not being withdrawn.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Bjelovar have kept their man, and Uskok go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
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 had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Uskok, and both men came out saying it was fine.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Uskok can pretend not to have heard.
Mate Pavlović 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. NK Osijek have kept their man, and Uskok go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Ivan Ninčević trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
A year in and the language has not come, the city has not opened up, and he eats alone more often than anybody at Uskok would like to admit. It is showing on Saturdays.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager makes Borna Lesjak a promise
The board have said in public what they had been saying in private. Results between now and the next meeting decide it, and everybody in the building knows the arithmetic.
Nothing has been announced and everybody understands what it means. A board that summons the whole football department on a Tuesday morning is a board that has stopped believing the problem will fix itself.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Uskok have done the hard part with HNK Rijeka, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Mate Pavlović 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.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Martin Małkowski has just signed for Uskok, and for once the answer mattered.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Uskok, another week without a signature from Mate Pavlović.
8 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Uskok can pretend not to have heard.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Krzysztof Moder is living that version at Uskok, and it tends to show in the first month.
Mate Pavlović 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 37, 3 points below where he was, and a body that has started charging interest. It happens to all of them and it is still the hardest paragraph on this page.
“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; Uskok are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Krzysztof Moder is 17, and Uskok have signed him for the player he will be rather than the one he is. The first team can wait; the point of a deal like this is the years it buys.
Bruno Juranovic is 16, and Uskok have signed him for the player he will be rather than the one he is. The first team can wait; the point of a deal like this is the years it buys.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Uskok this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad17 Apr 2028
Domagoj Prpić 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.
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Uskok, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The language has come, the shrug has gone, and he argues in training like a man who expects to be here next year. None of it shows up on a fee and all of it shows up on the pitch.
“Judge me on him.” Managers do not say that kind of thing by accident — it moves the pressure from Denis Cerovec’s shoulders onto his own, and both of them know it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Uskok can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Uskok this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Danijel Miškić 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.
7 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.
2 months left, and both sides know what that means: every week without a signature, the fee Uskok could ask drops and the wages Israel Boatwright can ask rise.
4 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Uskok this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad21 Feb 2028
Matko Zirdum 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 happens to all of them and it is still the hardest paragraph a local paper has to write. 36 years old, 3 points down on where he was, and a body that has started charging interest on a career.
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Antonio Knezevic has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
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. Uskok will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
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.
4 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Uskok can tell you which week it ends in.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Uskok this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 3 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Carlos Daniel Mejia Klinger was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“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 Uskok will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 0‑0, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Uskok this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Carlos Daniel Mejia Klinger 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.