Marked for Gregor Birsa
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market15 Feb 2027
The offer from Odd for Luka Verbic 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.
Squad15 Feb 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at NK Domzale this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Loan watch15 Feb 2027
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at NK Domzale, and 0 appearances in 5 say he has earned the hearing.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match4 Jan 2027
12 points, and a fixture list that is running out. The mathematics are not yet cruel, but they are no longer kind.
Market4 Jan 2027
Filip Cerin 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 NK Domzale can pretend not to have heard.
Market4 Jan 2027
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match5 Sep 2026
0‑3 against NK Krka, and no complaints that would survive the replay. The manager spoke about character afterwards; the terraces used shorter words.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Market7 Sep 2026
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Market7 Sep 2026
“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.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Gregor Birsa 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.
Boardroom7 Sep 2026
The music was off and the showers ran late. What was said in that dressing room stays there, but Saturday will publish the minutes.
Squad7 Sep 2026
“I want to play”: Asen Mitkov speaks
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
Squad7 Sep 2026
A place in the month's best eleven for Benjamin Birsa
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Benjamin Birsa has come out of that comparison in the side, and NK Domzale have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
Market7 Sep 2026
The name of Luka Handanovic keeps appearing in other people's back pages. NK Domzale say nothing, which says plenty.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market31 Aug 2026
NK Celje come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and NK Domzale did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Market31 Aug 2026
“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.
Match29 Aug 2026
NK Zavrc made NK Domzale work for it, but the scoreboard read 2‑1 at the end and the table does not ask how.
The terraces31 Aug 2026
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Filip Cerin 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.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Marked 8.12 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 16. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad31 Aug 2026
“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.
Squad31 Aug 2026
Sergio Bruno dropped after a run of poor form
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.
Squad31 Aug 2026
The plan did not have a place for Gregor Birsa
Nobody at NK Domzale is suggesting he is out of form. The manager simply wanted somebody with a different set of qualities for ninety specific minutes, and there is nothing a player can train to fix that.