“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 The request is on a desk at Hrvatski Dragovoljac, and it is not being withdrawn.
Two goals and a mark of 8.89 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Antonio Jakoliš 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.
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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 19-year-old it feels ownership of. Josip Bralić 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.
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.
6 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.
At 35 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.
Antonio Jakoliš 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.
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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Daniel Perisic is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Matej Juranovic has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Dominik Celija, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 7.91
A mark of 7.91 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.
A season average of 6.53 at an age when most of his year group are still in the youth team. Hrvatski Dragovoljac know what they have, and so, by now, does everybody else.
Boardroom6 Sep 2027
Deadline passes with 23 signed and 1 gone
That is the business done at Hrvatski Dragovoljac until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Hrvatski Dragovoljac have done the hard part with NK Varazdin, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
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.
In brief
Player ratingsJosip Bralić did the work nobody counts — 6.93
The dugoutThe manager makes an example of Karlo Kovačić
The board have said in public what they had been saying in private. Results between now and the next meeting decide it, and everybody in the building knows the arithmetic.
Hrvatski Dragovoljac had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Feyenoord, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
Marino Skelin 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Dinamo Zagreb have kept their man, and Hrvatski Dragovoljac go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Matej Modric is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Bruno Bilic is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
He is 32, he has been here since he was a boy, and the shirt he grew up expecting has been given to somebody flown in for it. That grievance belongs to the town as much as to the player.
He trains hard, says the right things and goes home to an empty flat. Nobody at Hrvatski Dragovoljac has done anything wrong, which is exactly what makes it so difficult to fix.
In brief
The dugoutKarlo Kovačić asks for a word with the manager
James Connolly 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Robert Pušaver was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Successful dribbles: 29. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Šime Perko, 18, plays like he has been here for years — 7.95
A mark of 7.95 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Hrvatski Dragovoljac this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Šime Perko is the division's best young player this month
At 18 he has spent a month being better than everybody his age in the league, which is a different and harder thing than one good afternoon. Hrvatski Dragovoljac will try very hard not to make too much of it.
Every club pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time it has been tried.
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.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 6 goals between Hrvatski Dragovoljac and Sesvete, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Olympiacos have kept their man, and Hrvatski Dragovoljac go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Robert Pušaver was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
15 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
0‑3 to Zadar, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
There is exactly one of these per career and it does not usually go like this. 1 on the scoresheet, 7.71 beside the name, and a crowd that had never seen him before chanting it by the end.
The board had gone up, the arguing had started, and then the ball was in the net in the 114th minute. Segesta will replay every second of the added time for a week.
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.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Josip Brkić did not need any: 7.89, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
The deal with Hajduk Split is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
The phone has started ringing about Josip Brkić again, and this time the name on the line is Imotski. Hrvatski Dragovoljac are listening politely and promising nothing.
Giovanni Jerolimov 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.
Antonio Jakoliš 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 thought about how hard another man trains, and Robert Pušaver was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Mate Majer has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Stipe Pjaca has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Mario Corluka is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.