Ivan Ilić

Defensive Midfielder - Free Agent
9 Nov 2035
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Overview Personal Contract News 4 Transfers Relations Events 47 Awards 29 Matches History

Marked for Ivan Ilić

453 Edition

The Schalke 04 Gazette

2 Apr 2035
From our football correspondent Steady

Market2 Apr 2035

Lucien Mahovo is on his way

The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Schalke 04 is pretending he will be back in the shirt.

Market2 Apr 2035

Pascal Klemens 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 The request is on a desk at Schalke 04, and it is not being withdrawn.

The dugout2 Apr 2035

Bernardo Lima keeps the receipts

“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Schalke 04 may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.

Market2 Apr 2035

Talks stall between Schalke 04 and Pau Cabanes

“We are a long way apart, and pretending otherwise helps nobody.” Neither side is close, and the calendar is not on the club's side.

Boardroom2 Apr 2035

The Schalke 04 board find $21.1M for the manager

Money, not words, and it is the only answer a manager ever wants. Spending $21.1M well is entirely his problem now.

The dugout2 Apr 2035

When it matters, Manu Koné plays

It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.

The dugout2 Apr 2035

Pau Cabanes 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.

Squad2 Apr 2035

A falling-out at Schalke 04

Tobias Müller and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Squad2 Apr 2035

Reuben Reid is no longer first choice

The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Reuben Reid has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.

In brief

Back issues
451 Edition

The Schalke 04 Gazette

19 Mar 2035
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Player ratings19 Mar 2035

A brace, and Assan Ouédraogo takes the afternoon — 8.49

There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Assan Ouédraogo provided it, and the 8.49 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.

The dugout19 Mar 2035

Ivan Ilić says Schalke 04 went back on their word

“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.

Market19 Mar 2035

Jesurun Rak-Sakyi has one foot out of the door

Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Schalke 04 they have already started talking about him in the past tense.

Market19 Mar 2035

Nidal Čelik 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 Schalke 04, and it is not being withdrawn.

Player ratings19 Mar 2035

Dan Ndoye, 34, rolls back the years — 7.86

There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.86 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.

Market19 Mar 2035

Schalke 04 turn down Viking for Lasse Nordås

The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.

Squad19 Mar 2035

Malik Tillman 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.

Match17 Mar 2035

Schalke 04 make home a hard place to visit

9 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.

Match17 Mar 2035

Assan Ouédraogo sends Schalke 04 past Köln

It finished 2‑0, and it was Assan Ouédraogo’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Schalke 04.

In brief

439 Edition

The Schalke 04 Gazette

25 Dec 2034
From our football correspondent Steady

Squad25 Dec 2034

Leon Kaiser breaks a bone — 34 days out

Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 34 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.

Market25 Dec 2034

Jesurun Rak-Sakyi has one foot out of the door

Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Schalke 04 they have already started talking about him in the past tense.

Squad25 Dec 2034

Words at Schalke 04 training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Malik Tillman 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.

Squad25 Dec 2034

Words exchanged at Schalke 04

Dan Ndoye 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.

The dugout25 Dec 2034

The manager makes an example of Manu Koné

“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.

Match23 Dec 2034

VfL Wolfsburg take the points off Schalke 04

Beaten 1‑2, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.

The dugout25 Dec 2034

Leon Neumann: “No excuses”

“I could talk about decisions and I could talk about luck. I will not. We lost.” The manager, 1‑2, and a press conference that lasted four minutes.

The dugout25 Dec 2034

Viktor Bjarki Daðason gets picked when it counts

Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Viktor Bjarki Daðason is on it.

The dugout25 Dec 2034

A promise honoured at Schalke 04

Something was said to Ivan Ilić and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.

In brief

403 Edition

The Schalke 04 Gazette

17 Apr 2034
From our football correspondent Steady

Squad17 Apr 2034

The knee: Pau Cabanes out for 35 days

35 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Schalke 04 lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.

Market17 Apr 2034

Only the photograph left for Pau Casadesús

Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Pau Casadesús will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Schalke 04 the goodbyes have quietly begun.

The dugout17 Apr 2034

No hiding place for Karl Hein

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

Boardroom17 Apr 2034

Zach Abbott will join Schalke 04 for nothing

The paperwork is done long before the player is. Zach Abbott has agreed terms to come here when his current deal runs out, which means Schalke 04 have spent a summer's transfer budget on a phone call.

Match15 Apr 2034

A bad afternoon for Schalke 04 against Borussia Dortmund

0‑2 to Borussia Dortmund, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.

Squad17 Apr 2034

Schalke 04 lose Heinrich Baumann

17 days, the medical staff say, and medical staff are optimists by profession. The team sheet will look wrong without him.

The dugout17 Apr 2034

Malik Tillman has become a man the manager trusts

Nobody at Schalke 04 will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.

Squad17 Apr 2034

Schalke 04 are still strangers to each other

7 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.

The dugout17 Apr 2034

The view from the dugout

“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑2 defeat, delivered by Leon Neumann to a room that had heard them before.

In brief