Marked for Jan Birsa
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market21 Dec 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.
Squad21 Dec 2026
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” CFR Cluj may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad21 Dec 2026
Jan Birsa 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 CFR Cluj this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Player ratings9 Nov 2026
Successful dribbles: 23. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad9 Nov 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at CFR Cluj this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad9 Nov 2026
Meriton Korenica 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.
Squad9 Nov 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.
Squad9 Nov 2026
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.
Match7 Nov 2026
The crowd waited for a goal that never came. Universitatea Craiova defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match31 Oct 2026
There were 89 minutes on the clock and Petrolul had all but banked the point. Football rarely reads the room, and CFR Cluj did not stop to explain themselves.
Player ratings2 Nov 2026
Successful dribbles: 26. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad2 Nov 2026
José Ortiz 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 CFR Cluj this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match31 Oct 2026
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Mohammed Kamara. 1‑0 against Petrolul, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Adrian Păun 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.
Player ratings2 Nov 2026
Marked 7.34. Ask anyone leaving the ground what settled it and you will get one name, which is the only award that has ever really counted.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Player ratings19 Oct 2026
Rok Birsa runs at them all day
Successful dribbles: 51. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad19 Oct 2026
A knee injury of the worst kind for Vid Bijol
76 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. NK Domzale lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Tijan Vasić is 19, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad19 Oct 2026
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.
Squad19 Oct 2026
The manager makes an example of Robert Aldama
“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 ratings19 Oct 2026
Marked 7.92. Ask anyone leaving the ground what settled it and you will get one name, which is the only award that has ever really counted.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad17 Aug 2026
A fracture rules Alexandru Stoian out for 40 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason CFR Cluj will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market17 Aug 2026
Astra come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and CFR Cluj did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 24. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Karlo Muhar 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 CFR Cluj this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Meriton Korenica 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.
Match15 Aug 2026
A 1‑1 draw with Viitorul leaves the dressing room somewhere between relief and regret.
Squad17 Aug 2026
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Off the bench and decisive: Jan Birsa
The substitution nobody applauded turned out to be the whole story. CFR Cluj were going nowhere until he came on.
Market17 Aug 2026
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Luka Zahovič’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
Rok Birsa runs at them all day
Successful dribbles: 59. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 9.32, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Market10 Aug 2026
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Squad10 Aug 2026
“The easiest signature of my career.” Antonio Bogdan and NK Domzale agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Luka Vipotnik 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.
Match8 Aug 2026
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Antonio Bogdan. 3‑2 against ND Gorica, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
A performance of 8.76 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Squad10 Aug 2026
The manager makes an example of Sandi Birsa
“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.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Words at NK Domzale training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Benjamin Vipotnik 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.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 49. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Market3 Aug 2026
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
A brace, and Antonio Bogdan takes the afternoon — 8.79
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Antonio Bogdan provided it, and the 8.79 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Market3 Aug 2026
“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.
Squad3 Aug 2026
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.
Match1 Aug 2026
Three points for NK Domzale, 2‑1 the final word against NK Krsko in a contest settled by the finer margins.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Words at NK Domzale training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Robert Pušaver 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.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Luka Vipotnik asks for a word with the manager
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Filip Lovric 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.