With the help of Soudani, the referee, and a last-second penalty, Dinamo Zagreb squeezed three points out of bottom-dwelling HNK Cibalia to maintain second place.
Dinamo led 1-0 in the 72nd minute when Amir Hodzic broke the long-standing scoreless match, but Cibalia stunned the crowd in Vinkovci with a goal in the 87th minute.
All looked to end in a 1-1 draw until El Abri Hillel Soudani found a way to draw a penalty in the 90th minute. Hodzic stepped up to the spot to score the winning goal.
The BBB protested their team’s win with throwing Dinamo shorts on the field and booing. Later, the HNS admitted the mistake, but made no effort to remedy the issue. Former Dinamo Zagreb and Hajduk Split player, Josko Jelicic was quoted on television saying, “I am ashamed to be in any form part of what’s called the HNL.”
Rijeka held on to their six-point lead over Dinamo with a 2-1 win in Zapresic the next day. Mario Gavranovic scored the game winner in the 48th minute after Josip Filipovic negated Rijeka’s early goal in the ninth minute.
Hajduk Split took out some frustration on NK Istra 1961 Friday after drawing their rivals RNK plit last week 1-1.
The Bili routed the Puljani 4-0 at Poljud thanks to goals from Ante Erceg, Nikola Vlasic, Ahmed Said, and Marko Fuctas. Hajduk remains 11 points behind Dinamo Zagreb and sit in third place.
NK Osijek is kicking themselves after dropping three points in Zagreb to NK Lokomotiva.
The outsider who looked to be a contender for the top three this year has dropped farther behind the third-place spot after a poor performance against Lokomotiva.
Both sides finished the match with 10 men after Osijek’s Mile Skoric was sent off in the 61st minute and Loko’s Ivan Sunjic followed suit in the 66th minute.
Osijek is now three points behind Hajduk Split for the third-place position.
RNK Split took advantage of the Cibalia loss and recorded their second win of the season to further distance themselves from certain doom.
Split traveled to Koprivnica and took down the home team with a 1-0 win.
Ivan Tomicic is credited with the 11th-minute goal.
The penalty for Dinamo, what a joke.
Colin,
How many games yet to play? With 10 team, does every team play 4 times against each other?