The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Hajduk Split have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Hajduk Split have gone to Zadar 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.
$800.0K was the most the club would pay and NK Osijek were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
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.
Squad21 Jun 2027
Ante Grbic has improved at 24, which nobody expected
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
Squad21 Jun 2027
Words at Hajduk Split training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Iker Pozo 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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Hajduk Split this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
In brief
The dugoutMarko Livaja has become a man the manager trusts
The dugoutThe manager makes Ivica Ivušić a promise
40 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Mateo Juričić will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Hajduk Split the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Hajduk Split 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 Iker Pozo was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Dennis Hadžikadunić trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Words at Hajduk Split training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Iker Pozo 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.
Nobody at Hajduk Split will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Marko Livaja signs something — a contract at Hajduk Split or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Numbers do not stay secret in a dressing room and never have. He is not asking for more than he is worth; he is asking why somebody beside him is worth more, and at Hajduk Split that is a harder question to answer.
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.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
“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 Hajduk Split know it.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Toni Ruso will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Hajduk Split the goodbyes have quietly begun.
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 Leander Dendoncker is on it.
35 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Hajduk Split lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Hajduk Split have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Sibenik waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Hajduk Split is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Al Jazira have kept their man, and Hajduk Split go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The offer from Sibenik for Duje Matić was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
$440.0K on the table at Lokomotiva Zagreb. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Everything was agreed until it was not, and Šime Perko reports back to Hajduk Split with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Words at Hajduk Split training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Šimun Hrgović 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.
Ante Grbic 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.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Roko Brajković provided it, and the 8.10 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
There comes a point where a club either backs its own ambition or admits it does not have any. Hajduk Split have paid $4.7M for Ante Grbic, which is the loudest way there is of saying which one it chose.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Toni Silić had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Ante Grbic has, at Hajduk Split, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Player ratings11 Jan 2027
Bruno Mišura, 18, plays like he has been here for years — 7.69
A mark of 7.69 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 18-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Deportivo Pereira had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
The offer from Slaven Belupo for Kristijan Kovac was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Zadar have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Kristijan Kovac 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.
Zadar have made the call to Panathinaikos. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Mate Sucic trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
The words a physio says slowly. 15 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.
Hajduk Split have gone to Polissia 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Hajduk Split can pretend not to have heard.
Hajduk Split have gone to Zadar 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.
An individual honour is a strange thing in a team game, and the best of them are never argued with. He has had the sort of year that ends with his name being read out, and Hajduk Split have had the benefit of it.
The offer went to Rudes this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
The phone has started ringing about Toni Silić again, and this time the name on the line is CFR Cluj. Hajduk Split are listening politely and promising nothing.
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 Leander Dendoncker is on it.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager makes an example of Lovre Lončar
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. Zadar will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
Robert Ćosić 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.
In brief
The dugoutMate Sucic asks for a word with the manager
The dugoutIlya Lunev has become a man the manager trusts
47 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
“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 Zadar, 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 Zadar 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 Andrea Bonetti was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody at Zadar will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Zadar, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Kristijan Kovac 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.
Kristijan Kovac 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mislav Kovacevic 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Zadar know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
In brief
The dugoutNikola Ivanovic has become a man the manager trusts
The dugoutDaniel Barisic asks for a word with the manager
47 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 30 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Dejan Pasalic was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody at Zadar will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 37 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Kristijan Kovac provided it, and the 9.36 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
4 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Ante Grbic 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Kristijan Kovac. 2‑1 against Sesvete, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
At 19 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.
Match21 Nov 2026
Another one collected away from home
3 on the bounce on the road for Zadar. The coaches leave early, arrive at unlovely grounds in the dark, and keep coming home with three points.
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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 44 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Ante Grbic 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.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 6 goals between Zadar and Cibalia, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Successful dribbles: 21. 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.
In brief
Player ratingsAnte Srna was on a different afternoon to everybody else
Successful dribbles: 34. 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Zadar will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Player ratings9 Nov 2026
A brace, and Ante Grbic takes the afternoon — 8.37
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Ante Grbic provided it, and the 8.37 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.07 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
At 23 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Zadar will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
4 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Kristijan Kovac 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.
8 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
The fixture the rest of the division is looking forward to more than either of the sides in it. Both know a win changes the season and a defeat does not end it, which is what makes it hard to play.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Zadar will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Zadar this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 17. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
The dugout12 Oct 2026
Ante Grbic is still being punished for one mistake
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Dejan Pasalic 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Zadar will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Zadar this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Andrea Bonetti 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.
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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 96 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Ante Grbic 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.
At 23 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Zadar will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Ante Grbic 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.
Two sides from the top of the table, one afternoon, and a month of talk decided in ninety minutes. Zadar will not use the word title this week and will not stop thinking it.
Successful dribbles: 18. 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.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Zadar will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Daniel Barisic had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
18 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
“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
Zadar close the window on a squad of their own making
1 in and 2 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Ante Srna. 3‑2 against Imotski, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
In brief
SquadAndrea Bonetti falls out with a teammate over standards
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Zadar will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
6 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for 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 Zadar, and it is not being withdrawn.
Kristijan Kovac 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 clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Zadar people have started saying his name in the past tense.
The offer from Hrvatski Dragovoljac for Bojan Simunovic was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
3 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.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Zadar and Sibenik in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Mateo Petkov had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
The name of Bojan Simunovic has come up in conversations Zadar were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Ante Grbic 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.
Successful dribbles: 30. 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Zadar this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Ante Grbic 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Ante Grbic. 2‑0 against Lucko, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Add another name to the list: Dugopolje have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Mateo Petkov. The answer from Zadar has not changed — yet.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
Ante Grbic was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.07. 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.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
Kristijan Kovac was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.03. 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.