“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Grobnican can pretend not to have heard.
Grobnican have gone to Orijent 1919 with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
Josip Tomašević 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.
Grobnican offered $11.0K; Croatia Zmijavci 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.
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.
Squad26 Jun 2028
Tonći Mujan 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 words a physio says slowly. 28 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 kind of year that ends with a name being read out in a hall. Grobnican had the benefit of it every week and now have the problem of everybody else knowing.
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Luka Žeželić has agreed terms with Solin for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
Dino Kapitanović 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.
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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Grobnican know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
In brief
The dugoutJosip Perišić knocks on the manager’s door
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Grobnican this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad27 Mar 2028
Words at Grobnican training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Dario Čanađija 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 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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Dario Čanađija signs something — a contract at Grobnican or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Roko Krapec trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
5 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
Tonći Mujan 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.
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
Some games turn on a moment; this one turned on a man. 7.24 on the card, and the Grobnican support went home talking about one name.
The dugout18 Oct 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.” Bruno Barisic chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
“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 Grobnican, and it is not being withdrawn.
Jurica Jurčec 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.
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 thought about how hard another man trains, and Dario Čanađija was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Mladost Zdralovi next, and one man in the Grobnican dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Grobnican know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
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.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Grobnican have done the hard part with Rudes, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Grobnican this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Grobnican asked and Istra 1961 said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Dario Čanađija 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.
6 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.
In brief
The dugoutMateo Tomić knocks on the manager’s door
MarketThe clock does Marko Tešija’s negotiating for him
Tonći Mujan 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Lokomotiva Zagreb have kept their man, and Grobnican go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Grobnican, another week without a signature from Tonći Mujan.
Grobnican have made the call to Lokomotiva Zagreb. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
5 arrivals, an average age nobody would call a squad, and a set of parents being shown around a building their sons will spend more time in than at home. The scouting has already happened; today is only the paperwork.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Vito Marot trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Grobnican know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Not a new contract, not a new number: a new place in the manager’s thinking, which is the only promotion in football that actually matters. Gonçalo Sousa has moved up it.
Moreno Živković 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Grobnican, and both men came out saying it was fine.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Grobnican this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Grobnican, another week without a signature from Marko Tešija.
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.
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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Dario Čanađija signs something — a contract at Grobnican or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
In brief
MarketThe clock does Marko Tešija’s negotiating for him