99 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Zadar lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Duje Colak 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 warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Domagoj Bilic 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.
17 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
“I watch every Zadar game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at HNK Vukovar 1991 runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Warm-up bib, ninety minutes of watching, and a handshake at the end that fooled nobody. Big matches tell you who a manager trusts; this one told Bruno Colak.
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.70 for the rest of 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.
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.
“I watch every Zadar game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Hajduk Split runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
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.
21 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
“I watch every Zadar game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Hajduk Split runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
It is a small honour and it is not nothing: somebody watched every match in the division and decided that Bruno Colak was the best thing in any of them.
In brief
SquadThe plan did not have a place for Matej Sucic
Robert Kasalo wins it after the whistle should have gone
92 minutes played. Robert Kasalo found the finish in time that only existed because of earlier delays, and Cibalia went from a point to nothing inside one movement.
“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.
The deal that would have taken Nikola Babic to Sibenik has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Zadar with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
Domagoj Sutalo 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.
“I watch every Zadar game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Dinamo Zagreb runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Duje Colak, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 7.90
A mark of 7.90 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
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.
21 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Duje Colak 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.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Zadar has been clear about where Daniel Lovren stands, which is more than many ever get.