Josip Stanišić is now the final Croatian remaining in the Champions League and the only hope for one of our players to lift the trophy.
After Manchester City were eliminated by Real Madrid, both Mateo Kovačić and Joško Gvardiol were knocked out, with neither involved due to injury. If they were fully fit, things could have looked different.
Now, all eyes turn to Stanišić. Vincent Kompany recently called him a key player for the squad, so the hope remains that one of our Vatreni can bring the title home.
Stanišić made his mark in the second leg today, registering an assist for Harry Kane on Bayern’s second goal as they defeated Atalanta 10-2 on aggregate.
Bayern Munich youngster Filip Pavić also made his debut, coming on for Stanišić. The young defender is currently a Germany youth international and is eligible for Croatia.
I’m going to Orlando for the Brazil game… Any good Croatian restaurants or bars in Orlando that anyone can recommend?
Just for the heck of it I need a search of Croatian bars restaurants in the area. Nothing, but a Puerto Rican establishment came up call Crocante but seems interesting enough, not from the area., 4.4 out of 5, not a recommendation from my experience.
https://www.restaurantji.com/fl/orlando/crocante-restaurant-/
If ever there was a croat name itd be filip pavic. Great job by the nt pushing hard in recent years to get these guys. Who knows if we’ll ever hear of him again. Gabriel vidovic was a bayern ii star. Now he sucks. None the less, you want to just get as many bites of the apple with these young guys as you can cause some might work out .
Croatia should also continue to open itself up to migration from both the Middle East and Africa. Many other nations football has greatly benefited by harnessing talent from these areas and have had societal benefits of a more diverse country bringing down racism and increasing fresh ideas, exposure and collaboration. Croatia which is in need of a population boost desperately needs this influx .
……said Marko Thompson, to Ivan Mestrovic. ……. Not going to bite,
I was made to believe that Pulisic parents were Olib born. Many dalmatians are mixed Italian Croatia blood over the years. I will do better research. 3rd generation explains the total self-serving indifferent Croatian when it behooves me, I can do without your picnic blanket jersey attitude.
Trying to bring all these people back over the brink is not a long-term solution.
My dream is that Croatia somehow, develops an economy that let’s more people stay in the homeland. Croatia 1st movement is needed. If Slovenia can do it, Croatia can as well. AI with change everything as well, we don’t know the impact.
It is not easy, Ireland encouraged American Pharmaceutical companies to move to the homeland by giving them free tax existence, water, utilities, just bring the great jobs. Only thing is even Ireland way lose it traditional culture.
No easy answers. The only constant is Change, doesn’t sound like a good Marko Thompson song title.
Most Dalmatians do not have any Italian blood. There were some but a lot were pushed out by the Communists after WW2.
Costal Istrians do, but the inland Istrians do not.
We don’t really need to bring back diaspora Croats from faraway places like Aus, Can or USA. It would be nice, but if people aren’t moving back now they never will. Croatia’s a great safe place to live for a diaspora Croat, it’s just that people have established deep roots in their new countries so it’s difficult to go back.
Croatia will just always be a lower populated slower economy with a lot of beauty. HDZ is doing some good things economically, especially with energy, but people will always bounce back and forth between other EU countries and Croatia especially with remote working becoming a thing. I know so many who are just bouncing around between countries within the Schengen zone for work, but are still very much Croats and are in Croatia more than half the year.
People don’t realize that playing for Croatia is way more opportunistic. Teams like Germany, Brazil and Italy are falling apart because they lack structure and talent pool. Croatia is only going up. Everyone doubted us and thought our run in 2018 was a fluke when it wasn’t. The youth we have and now with this young star Pavic with potentially switching over to us is a blessing. Teams like Canada, USA and other smaller European nations are improving only because of importing. We are the only pure team that recruits and uses our own. I’m ok with a few here and there if a team wants to use some but at this point it’s unrecognizable these teams. No identity whatsoever. Croatia will be set for many years to come despite the declining birth rate. That’s why teams like Netherlands, France, Belgium, and others would h where they are if they were pure? Hell no. Same applies to Spain. Tamale and Williams off that team isn’t a championship team. We have a declining population but still manage to be there every year and beat major teams and get past the group stage to make deep runs.
I would rather grab bayerns “germatian!”goalie Leon klanac to flip allegiances but doesn’t look promising he is 19 and they are really high on him .even though he’s only 6’ tall.3 of our defenders are set in stone for the next decade in Luka Josip and Josko but our GK situation is wonky at best.
Leon Klanac has a Croatian passport, so that’s good.
The two CBs who start in front of him at Bayern’s U19 squad are both Croats (Puljic and Mijatovic) playing for our National Team.
We have so much talent coming up if this kid choose Hrvatska we would legit have a team that can go into multiple tournaments and have serious expectations to win it.
I watched him play today I can’t believe how he moves with such easy for such a tall player. He’s gonna choose us I mean either you play with a bunch of Turks or with hrvati simple decision if you ask me. Just follow the stanisic way.
He looked very comfortable on the ball, and it is obvious that he prefers to play as a CB. Apparently, he can also play as an RB or defensive midfielder. To me he did not look overly tall, but he is only 16 so he will grow a bit more.
I read something in the media a few weeks back that Bayern is putting pressure on him to choose Germany. I guess we will have to wait and see what happens in the future ?
He’s in the same boat as Stanišić was.
They’ll try and ruin his career if he chooses us.
We really need this Filip Pavić to switch and play for us.
Already in the Bayern first team and plays multiple positions (RB, CB, and CDM).
Would be a very useful piece in our backline or as cover for Sucic.
If he is first generation german or born in Croatia, hopefully we have a chance but if he is 1st generation fake Croatian, like Pulisic we have no chance.
Different situation.
Pulisic’s mom is Italian, and his dad is a Croat born in New York.
Pulisic is third generation, and only partial Croat. He was raised in Pennsylvania where there is a big Croat community, but I doubt he ever traveled to Croatia and he only spoke English at home.
Whereas, Filip Pavic’s parents are both Croats, and they spoke Croatian first in the house. His parents are only in Croatia as Gastarbeiters (workers) and they regularly go back to Croatia (as their family is there).
Pavic very likely wants to play for Croatia instead of Germany, but he’s under pressure from the German FA and Bayern for sure.
There is also the added complication that Croatia’s future backline will be much harder to crack than Germany’s, since we already have two established stars in Gvardiol (24) and Vuskovic (19) cemented in our backline…and we have a collection of other interesting prospects all vying for the remaining spots.
If this Pavic kid is focused more on his career than his homeland, this could be a factor as well.
Came across this article on Seg choosing Croatia over Aus.
https://www.theguardian.com/football/2026/mar/19/the-one-who-got-away-how-did-australia-lose-one-of-its-brightest-football-talents-to-croatia
Great insight from Didulica as to why players of quality and potential would choose to represent Croatia. Thanks for posting the link.
Tottenham (Igor Tudor) vs Atletico Madrid What a game that was! Tottenham was far better team and should have went through the Champions League. It seems that Tudor is giving the players confidence and desire to win games.
Tottenham (Igor Tudor) vs Atletico Madrid What a game that was! Tottenham was far better team and should have went through the Champions League. If you take this game, It seems that Tudor is giving confidence to the players and the desire to fight to win.