Fran Cop

Right Midfielder - Free Agent
4 Dec 2027
Saturday
Process

Marked for Fran Cop

56 Edition

The Zadar Gazette

23 Aug 2027
From our football correspondent Crisis

Market

Antonio Vukas hands in a written request

“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Zadar can pretend not to have heard.

Match

The wait goes on for Zadar

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.

Squad

Fran Majer in a row with a teammate

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.

Match

Zadar come up short against HNK Vukovar 1991

HNK Vukovar 1991 left with the points after a 1‑2 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.

Squad

The manager makes an example of Juan Múnera

“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.

Player ratings

Antonio Vukas runs at them all day

Successful dribbles: 16. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.

In brief

Back issues
12 Edition

The Zadar Gazette

19 Oct 2026
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad

A fracture rules Mato Knezevic out for 113 days

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.

Market

Fran Cop puts it in writing

“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 The request is on a desk at Zadar, and it is not being withdrawn.

Match

Ivica Corluka’s goal not enough for Zadar

Ivica Corluka scored, and precious little else went right: 1‑2 to Sibenik, and a quiet walk to the dressing room.

In brief

8 Edition

The Zadar Gazette

21 Sep 2026
From our football correspondent Triumph

Player ratings

Both of them Damir Cop's — 8.94

2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.94, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.

Match

Zadar make it 5 in a row

Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Zadar have 5 straight wins of it.

Market

Fran Cop puts it in writing

“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.

Squad

Tempers go at Zadar

Antonio Vukas 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.

Match

Zadar get the job done against Sesvete

A 2‑0 win over Sesvete, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.

Match

Sesvete blown away early

There is a particular helplessness in conceding 2 times before the twentieth minute. Sesvete tried to reorganise, Zadar did not allow it, and the result was written long before it was confirmed.

Player ratings

Antonio Vukas runs at them all day

Successful dribbles: 14. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.

Squad

Goran Bjelica 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.

Squad

The division's best last weekend was a Zadar man

It is a small honour and it is not nothing: somebody watched every match in the division and decided that Damir Cop was the best thing in any of them.

In brief

4 Edition

The Zadar Gazette

24 Aug 2026
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

Zadar bow out of the cup

Imotski go through and Zadar go home, 0‑1 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.

Match

Zadar run riot against Hrvatski Dragovoljac

3‑0, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.

Squad

Damir Cop takes the match ball home

3 goals in one afternoon from one man. The other players were also present, a witness confirmed.

Market

Milan Boric asks to leave Zadar

“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.

Player ratings

Damir Cop in the eights

A performance of 9.55 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.

Squad

Juan Múnera 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.

Squad

Petar Nemet in a row with a teammate

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.

Player ratings

Antonio Rebic runs at them all day

Successful dribbles: 16. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.

Squad

Costly mistake from Juan Múnera

An error at the back is a moment; an error in goal is a goal. Juan Múnera knows it, the crowd knew it instantly, and there was nobody behind him to make it anything else.

In brief

3 Edition

The Zadar Gazette

17 Aug 2026
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Zadar tear Sibenik apart

Rarely has this fixture seen a display like it: 3‑0 against Sibenik, and it could have been more.

Player ratings

Petar Corluka scores twice — 8.49

Two goals and a mark of 8.49 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.

Market

Hrvatski Dragovoljac come back empty-handed

The bid was some way short and Zadar did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.

Match

Zadar cannot stop winning

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.

Squad

Antonio Vukas in a row with a teammate

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.

The terraces

The crowd has taken to Petar Corluka

At 22 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.

Squad

No hiding place for Antonio Vukas

“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Antonio Vukas, and the manager let it.

Squad

Bojan Kasalo 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.

Squad

Zadar count the cost of losing Antonio Erceg

27 days, the scan says, and scans are kinder than reality. The fixtures in that window have just become somebody else’s job.

In brief