The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Hrvace have lost him in all but the paperwork.
“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 The request is on a desk at Hrvace, and it is not being withdrawn.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Hrvace have done the hard part with Slaven Belupo, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
Squad26 Jul 2027
Words at Hrvace training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Marin Leovac 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.
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.
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Opatija had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
Everything agreed with Dugopolje, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Squad12 Jul 2027
Words at Hrvace training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Marcel Lorber 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.
Hrvace asked and Dinamo 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Hrvace this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Dinamo Zagreb have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
“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 The request is on a desk at Hrvace, and it is not being withdrawn.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Maks Slunjski was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Leon Jadek 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.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Borna Pausić, and the manager let it.
Squad31 May 2027
7 new faces, and Hrvace 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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Maks Slunjski trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 32 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Ivano Kolarik 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.
Stefan Jovanoski and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Words at Hrvace training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Rukavina 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.
Everybody saw it before anybody said it. At 37 the numbers say 3 points down on what he was, and the question for Hrvace is how to handle a man they owe a great deal.
“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.
Squad29 Mar 2027
5 new faces, and Hrvace 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Gabriel Rukavina 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 Hrvace will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
He trains hard, says the right things and goes home to an empty flat. Nobody at Hrvace has done anything wrong, which is exactly what makes it so difficult to fix.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Hrvace know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
A season average of 7.08 at an age when most of his year group are still in the youth team. Hrvace know what they have, and so, by now, does everybody else.
Maks Slunjski and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad8 Feb 2027
Words at Hrvace training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Rukavina 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.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Leon Jadek, and the manager let it.
Squad8 Feb 2027
A place in the month's best eleven for Ivano Kolarik
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Ivano Kolarik has come out of that comparison in the side, and Hrvace have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Hrvace have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Boardroom1 Feb 2027
Deadline passes with 5 signed and 0 gone
That is the business done at Hrvace 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.
Ivano Kolarik 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Dubrava have kept their man, and Hrvace go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Maks Slunjski was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
He is doing things every Saturday that nobody around him can answer. It is flattering for a season and a problem after that, and Hrvace know which stage they are at.
Hrvace have made the call to NK Varazdin. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
The hardest thing about being 18 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Šime Perko did not need any: 8.00, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Stefan Jovanoski is 20, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
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.
Stefan Jovanoski 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 most common injury in the game and the most rushed back from. Hrvace will quote 15 days and will be careful with it, because the second one is always worse than the first.
3 kept out in the shoot-out, and a stadium that will still be describing them in twenty years. A goalkeeper only needs one of these to be remembered forever.
Successful dribbles: 26. 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Everybody saw it before anybody said it. At 38 the numbers say 3 points down on what he was, and the question for Hrvace is how to handle a man they owe a great deal.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Words at Hrvace training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Maks Slunjski 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.
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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Maks Slunjski was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Hrvace this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Signings arrive with a picture of the club in their head, and this one’s picture was bigger than the building. He will play well and he will be gone, in that order, and everybody knows it.
Behind, and beaten by any honest reading, until minute 86. Sesvete had the points in their pocket and a corner of the ground still believed, which is generally when it happens.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Hrvace, another week without a signature from Maks Slunjski.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Maks Slunjski has just signed for Hrvace, and for once the answer mattered.
Hrvace asked and NK Varazdin said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Maks Slunjski 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.
Leon Jadek 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 19-year-old it feels ownership of. Paul Vranjičić 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.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Josip Petkov 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. Mislav Kovac is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Duje Rebic 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. Mislav Ivanovic 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.