Well, European qualifying was an absolute disaster for every Croatian club across the board.
At the beginning of qualifying one month ago, it was safe to say Dinamo would land a Champions League or Europa League spot, at worst, and one of either Hajduk, Rijeka, or Osijek would earn a berth into the Conference League group stage. Instead, it will only be Dinamo Zagreb representing Croatia in Europe this season…and it will be in the weakest tournament: Conference League (3rd tier).
It’s an absolute disaster for the HNL as European football federations ranked 14-19 are in such a tight battle for coefficient points and an ultimate second Champions League spot. No matter who you root for in the HNL, it’s always good for Croatian clubs to do well in Europe for the league as a whole. Dinamo absolutely shit the bed in their last two 2nd leg matches. They were in control against AEK Athens in Champions League qualifying until conceding two goals in injury time. Then they blew a 3-1 1st leg advantage against Sparta Prague which would have booked them a respectable Europa League berth.
With Hajduk and Osijek being ousted in the last round, Rijeka held their own in a valiant extra time effort against 2021 French Ligue 1 champions, Lille. Rijeka held 1-0 leads across both legs but couldn’t keep Lille out of the net for the rest of the match in both legs. Dinamo will be be favorites to make it out of Conference League group stage, no matter how the draw goes. However, it will be a gloomy European season for Croatian fans with only Dinamo playing…in Conference League. Disappointing to say the least.
Silver lining: check out this Baturina goal!
Hey those of you who watched the 4-1 defeat to Sparta Praha, how was Baturina’s performance besides the wonderful goal he scored?
He was no good in the first half. Had a good second half unlike the two other midfielders Misic and Bulat, both were bad for the entire match.
Thanks MART!👍
Bittersweet seeing pjaca move to Rijeka…he had so much talent…another stud whose career was imploded by a knee injury and in a friendly to boot.
Benkovic at the break for his side. Erlic played the full 90 for Sassuolo alongside our old friend Jeremy Toljan.
Ive seen the Dinamo games and the Rijeka games (although I missed the first 40 minutes)
If I had to lineup one croatian team from these two games. It would be;
Gk ; Labrovic
LB : Smolcic
Centrral defenders : Mitrovic and Galesic
RB ; Goda
Number 6 ; Selahi
Number 8 . Hodza
Number 10 ; Fruk
Left winger : Baturina
Right winger ; Pasalic
Attack : Petkovic
Very dissapointed in Bulat and Misic. The game in the first half went too fast for them.
Petkovic is no doubt the best playet in the HNL.
Baturina is class.
Finally, some luck for Dinamo in UCL draw.
They will play against Astana, Victoria Plzen and Ballkani from Kosovo.
Even with the current squad of players they should come first or second in the group.
Borna Sosa to Ajax. Completing medical today and verbal agreement in place.
His defensive game got badly exposed at the World Cup.
Lots of teams were loving this guy before then, but his value took a massive dive after that. Still a great offensive player on the flank.
It’s good to see Ajax with three Croatian backline players.
Kovacic and Gvardiol will build chemistry together at Man City, and you’ll have Sutalo, Sosa and Medic (assuming he gets future callups) all developing together at Ajax as well.
Surprisingly, Šutalo has not been in the Ajax lineup yet- not sure how long it takes to integrate a new player? Given Šutalo’s calibre, and the money Ajax paid for him, I would think that they would be eager to get him playing asap?
I wouldn’t worry. He joined Ajax less than two weeks ago.
He played for Dinamo against AEK on August 19th.
Ajax were already preparing for their two-game Europa qualifiers against Ludogorets a few days later, so they probably didn’t want to rush him into the lineup.
Ajax haven’t played a league game since he arrived, so they’ll probably bring him in for the actual league game on Sunday.
Dinamo is in a rebuilding stage and will take some time to replace Livakovic, Josip Sutalo and Ivanusec. Three of them played in the first leg in Zagreb and have since departed. That is the main reason Dinamo lost tonight. If you add to the departed list Orsic and Ademi you can see that the side lacks experience and most importantly quality to compete in Europe. Playing in the UCL may not be such a bad thing for Dinamo, they will be competitive and will most likely qualify for the knockout stages.
I would not right them off in HNL despite having a poor start to the season, however I do think that Hajduk is a slight favorite to win the title.
there’s two ways to look at this “rebuilding” comment you made:
1) they have the money and have had money for a long time. they knew who was going to be sold and didn’t react…they sold Orsic last season, then their captain Ademi, then they knew Livakovic, Ivanusec and Sutalo were all leaving but what did they do to secure replacements?
2) how’s their youth program going recently? who’s coming up to the first team?
managing a club requires a steady flow of talent whether you’re producing them through your youth program or by buying in the market. can you tell me a time in the last 15 years when Dinamo didn’t have a solid team at all positions? they currently struggle at several positions and considering the fact they have the money but have waited until everyone has been sold should make anyone scratch their head. I think Dinamo has made more money in the last 3 years than they have in the past 10…so there should be no excuse. all the responsibility lies on the shoulders of Barisic and Simic, they guaranteed this club will function better than when Mamic was there.
I’ll start off with Rijeka…I really felt sorry for these guys, they worked their asses off and did a very good job competing with fairly good team LOSC Lille! Rijeka were energized and hard working, creating some excellent plays and were less than 10 minute’s from pk’s when LOSC scored. At the end of the day I feel proud of the boys from Rijeka, they did well!
Now for Dinamo! Yep, I am a Dinamovac (but like I’ve always said, I appreciate all teams in HR and I enjoy seeing the different good players at the different clubs in the HNL) so I’ll get to my point!
Dario Simic and Mirko Barisic got what they wanted. They took control of Dinamo, got rid of Mamic and for the first time in a very long time, Dinamo are beginning to look like a club thats super nervous in making transactions…buying an injured Kacavenda (on loan…apparently for 6 months) who is going for surgery soon, buying Stojkovic after weeks and weeks of talks…it appeared to me as if the club was desperate to get their confirmation for the Sutalo, Livakovic and Ivanusec transfers prior to committing to Stojkovic…and then BOOM, he gets badly injured.
so now, the club is selling Mamic’s players and taking their time to fill in the gaps where they sold…being far too slow and over calculating.
Todays game was really atrocious and I’m not sure I can handle a dysfunctional club after having it work like a clock for soo many years. If this season ends up being a big shit show, I’m hoping the public will demand Mamic comes back! He’s good for Dinamo and for our National team!
He is also a convicted criminal. Do we want to go through his history of threatening players and their parents. No wonder Modric and Lovren lied in court to protect him. He might have them killed
Mamic wasn’t a coach. He is a criminal.
Did he really threaten parents and players?
He doesn’t strike me as the type to do physical harm to people.
He’s a cutthroat businessman who was found guilty of embezzling funds….but I’m not sure if he’s a true “mafijaš” as people make him out to be.
If you are dinamo fan, then its pretty easy to find out the players and parents he tried to destroy. One of a current national team member.
There is more. Modric lied in court for a reason.
Mamic was shot in the leg for a reason.
Who? Kramarić?
Still. I don’t think he’s ever physically assaulted anyone, and I don’t think he’s attempted to kill anyone either.
He may be cutthroat, but I don’t think your claim of him “having people killed” is something he’s capable of. You seem to be fine with people attempting to kill him though, haha.
Football is corrupt in every country. There are much worse actors in Croatian football than him (just ask Kranjčar’s former agent).
Mamić just happened to be the loudest and most successful. He made it easy to be that example.
I think we should try and keep the sport corrupt-free, but this means applying the law evenly and going after everybody equally.
For example, I still don’t understand how Damir Mišković suddenly owns Rijeka. Did Daniele Volpi just give him the team? Where did Mišković get that kind of money? The purchase was so quick and secretive.
If Mamić is being tarred and feathered for “corruption”, then isn’t Mišković worth looking into?
Instead, I see him and HNS President Kustić sitting together in the match against Lille.
I wouldn’t be surprised if Mišković embezzled funds and sketched his tax returns too.
Baturina giving Dinamo life / hope with a great finish!
Always gotta make a run for Champions League to increase the coefficient (also the different in prize money is huge).
Zvezda actually got automatic qualification to Champions League due to Serbia increasing their coefficient a lot over recent years.
Same goes for Scotland who managed to get both Rangers and Celtic in there last year (despite Rangers embarrassing themselves).
If teams like Zvezda and Rangers are automatic fixtures in Champions League (and are getting 15-20 million in prize money year over year) then Dinamo needs to always aim to get in, no matter what.
This would be the equivalent of being able to keep Olmo, Gvardiol, Majer and Sutalo for a few more years (rather than selling them for 14-21 million a piece).
This is how much of an impact that prize money can be.
Imagine Dinamo having a lineup last year of Livakovic, Gvardiol, Sutalo, Misic, Olmo, Majer, Ivanusec, Orsic, Petkovic.
They’d just have to buy a couple of fullbacks and the team would be unreal.
I am hoping that Osijek (with all that Hungarian money) and Hajduk (with their recent improvements) can become European regulars.
We need 3-4 European regulars and we can easily surpass Scotland who has a #9 ranked country coefficient for their middling league.
You can not compare what Zvezda is doing to Dinamo. Zvezda has more money available.
and they will get embarrassed out of CL
Of course we can compare the two
I think a bunch of Arab billionaires own Zvezda, so that’s what Davor was alluding to.
Zvezda can pay higher transfer fees as well as pay their existing players a competitive salary to keep them a bit longer, whereas Dinamo has to sell their players like Gvardiol and Olmo to give them the opportunity to earn multimillion dollar salaries elsewhere.
My point was that we produce so much more talent than teams like Rangers or Zvezda (despite the big financial disadvantage) and if we can manage to squeeze into Champions League every year, that prize money could be the cash we use to keep players a bit longer (and sell them a little later).
Dinamo had a great group of players over these past couple of years, but never got a chance to see them all play together in action (Olmo, Majer, Gvardiol, Sutalo, etc.).
I am not sure who the Zvezda owners are but they get govt. funding
If that’s the case, then yes, they have a lot of money to spend.
I’m almost positive that the government sold a majority of Zvezda to some sketchy arabs who set up some company in the UAE.
I’m sure a lot of money is being embezzled through Zvezda. We’ll probably hear of it when the team has to suddenly sell off all their players to cover the millions in debt they’re eventually left with.