A mark of 7.71 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 17-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Stefan Gudelj 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.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Words at Grafičar training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Nikola Simić 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.
At 17 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.
At 17 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. Grafičar will try very hard not to make too much of it.
Every club in football 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 somebody has tried it.
“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 Grafičar, and 6 appearances in 10 say he has earned the hearing.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Grafičar this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Words at Grafičar training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Nikola Simić 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.
Level with 95 minutes on the clock, after an afternoon Grafičar had all but put away. Ušće will call it a point earned; the home dressing room will call it two given away, and both of them are right.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 1‑1, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
Two goals and a mark of 8.76 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 17 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Ognjen Ajdar 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 pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Savo Radanović, and the manager let it.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Words at Grafičar training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Stefan Gudelj 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.
Everybody saw it before anybody said it. At 35 the numbers say 3 points down on what he was, and the question for Grafičar is how to handle a man they owe a great deal.
Miljan Vukadinović 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.
Everybody saw it before anybody said it. At 37 the numbers say 3 points down on what he was, and the question for Grafičar is how to handle a man they owe a great deal.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Nikola Simić was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Something was said to Nikola Simić and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
11 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 dugout12 Oct 2026
Nikola Simić is still being punished for one mistake
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
Khalid Butti is 35 and has run out of things to prove. What he has left is where to stand, when to slow it down and what to say at half-time, and none of that is on a fitness chart.
Smederevo 1924 next, and one man in the Grafičar dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 6 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
At 20 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Miljan Vukadinović 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.
1‑3 to Trayal Kruševac, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Nikola Simić 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.
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.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑3, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
A mark of 8.61 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 17-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
At 37 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.95 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Grafičar this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
At 17 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Darko Lazić was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Successful dribbles: 17. 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.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 16 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Nikola Simić was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 3 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
The shape wanted a different profile against this opponent, which is a real football answer and no comfort at all to the man it is about. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
Nikola Simić 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.
10 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.
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 0‑0 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
Nobody at Grafičar 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.
Ninety minutes, no goals, and the argument started before the car park emptied: a point gained, or two thrown away against Zemun? Both sides of it will still be going on Thursday.
Nikola Simić arrived with a record at a bigger club than this one, and the room has treated him accordingly. The young ones watch him train; the senior ones watch to see whether it lasts.
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one Grafičar will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
The offer from Ušće for Nikša Delibašić 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.
Every paper's favourite story and every manager's least. What happened is being dealt with internally, which is the phrase clubs use when they would rather nobody asked again.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 17 arrived, 13 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
The deal with Utrecht 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.
Tempers went at Grafičar this week. Nothing a hard session and a quiet word cannot repair, though the story got out all the same.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Words at Grafičar training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Stefan Gudelj 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.
“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.
The dugout7 Sep 2026
Darko Lazić is still being punished for one mistake
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
Slaviša Stojanović 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.
Grafičar asked and Vojvodina said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
He is doing things every Saturday that nobody around him can answer. It is flattering for a season and a problem after that, and Grafičar know which stage they are at.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Grafičar, another week without a signature from Slaviša Stojanović.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Stefan Veličković was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 7 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Grafičar can pretend not to have heard.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Grafičar have done the hard part with Vojvodina, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Marked 7.72. There is a kind of forward whose value only shows up when you count what he was involved in rather than what he finished, and this is the day that argument makes itself.
The hardest thing about being 17 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Aleksa Damjanović did not need any: 8.01, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
David Starčević 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.
Grafičar asked and Cukaricki said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 17-year-old it feels ownership of. Aleksa Damjanović 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.
He is doing things on a Saturday afternoon that nobody around him can answer, which is flattering for about one season and a problem after that. Grafičar will not keep him by pretending otherwise.
A loan enquiry to Radnik Surdulica: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
In brief
Transfer targetsA loan move for Abba Adam Oscar is in the works
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Grafičar this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Radnik Surdulica have kept their man, and Grafičar go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Marko Pavlovic 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Slobodan Vlahovic 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. Andrija Savic 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. Predrag Matic is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. Grafičar know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
Slavia Prague have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
In brief
Transfer targetsA loan move for Luka Đorđević is in the works
Squad6 new faces, and Grafičar are still learning each other
Grafičar asked and Vojvodina said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Borac Čačak left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Stefan Gudelj 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.
Veljko Ilić 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 easiest signature of my career.” Miljan Vukadinović and Grafičar agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Veljko Ilić’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Grafičar needing him to play as if none of it matters.