It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Imotski this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Words at Imotski training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Dragan Lovrić 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 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.
Martín Lucero 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.
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Words at Imotski training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Marin Jonjić 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.
A defender's mistake gets tidied up by somebody else; a goalkeeper's ends up in the net. He knew before the ball crossed the line, and so did everybody in the ground.
Dragan Lovrić 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.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Martín Lucero 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 attempts, none of them in. He got into the right places all afternoon, which is the hard part, and did the easy part badly — and that is the version of a bad day a manager can live with.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Imotski this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Words at Imotski training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Martín Lucero 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.
11 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.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.02 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 Imotski this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Mate Šuto, and the manager let it.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Marin Jonjić 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.
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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Matías Laurino signs something — a contract at Imotski or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Imotski this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Words at Imotski training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Martín Lucero 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.
Shots: 6. Goals: none. The chances were there and they were good ones, and they went into the stand, the goalkeeper's arms and the side netting in roughly that order.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Imotski can pretend not to have heard.
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.81 for the rest of it.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Imotski this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
6 goals in one match, Marin Jonjić on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Imotski and Cibalia.
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.
It needed Marin Jonjić to find the net to bring anything home at all: 3‑3 against Cibalia, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
Squad31 Aug 2026
The manager has not finished forgetting Šime Žužul's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
Martín Lucero 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.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Words at Imotski training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Marin Jonjić 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.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 18 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
9 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.
Shots: 8. Goals: none. The chances were there and they were good ones, and they went into the stand, the goalkeeper's arms and the side netting in roughly that order.
Dragan Lovrić 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.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Martín Lucero 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.
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. Imotski know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
Dragan Lovrić 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 terraces10 Aug 2026
Imotski spend $45.0K on the signing the town wanted
It is the rarest sequence in football: supporters ask for something, and the club goes and does it. $45.0K for Ivan Omazić, and for one week nobody is complaining about anything.
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.
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.
A brace, and Josip Kilić takes the afternoon — 8.90
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Josip Kilić provided it, and the 8.90 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Imotski this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Words at Imotski training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Marin Jonjić 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.