Luka Modrić and AC Milan have gone top of Serie A (tied on points with Napoli and Roma) after a huge 2-1 victory over Napoli Sunday night at San Siro! Modrić played the full 90 minutes as Milan went down to 10 men in the 57th minute. SempreMilan gave Modrić a solid 8/10 rating as he had “Good passing, work-rate, movement and so on. All the things we have become used to seeing from the Croatian at the start of this season. He also got a slight deflection on Neres’ shot at the end, which kept it from hitting the back of the net. I’m still so impressed by his work-rate, even late in the games.”
Luka Vušković continues to impress in Germany. He received a 8.3 SOFAscore rating Sunday night as Hamburg played out a 0-0 draw vs. Union Berlin. He helped in the clean sheet andiron 18 aerial duels, which is the most in the past five season in Europe’s top-5 leagues. He’s doing what he is supposed to do.
Joško Gvardiol got the start Saturday and played 70 minutes as Man City cruised to a 5-1 win over Burnley. With Liverpool losing to Palace at the death, City now only trail 1st place by 5 points. Gvardiol received a 7/10 rating from Manchester Evening News as he “Didn’t have much to worry about defensively and stuck it up for Haaland at the back post for the second goal.” Mateo Kovačić returned from injury for the first time this season to join the City bench. He did not feature in the match.
btw: remember Anonymous broke the news that T’s Japan defender Kota Takai aka Mr. Small Feet plantar fasciitis would likely be a chronic issue?
Well fast-forward two months – and he still isn’t training with T and there is no timeline when he returns lol
This is croatiansports.com, not your twitter account
Based on the highlights Kule was excellent
Anonymous finally realized who Kule reminds of
Jamie Vardy (who also blossomed very late – was playing non-League until 25 y/o when he moved to 2nd division Leicester – first England cap at 28 y/o)
A hyper-active energized bunny running every where on the pitch
He’s a terror for defenders due to his pressing
Also, for the goal that he scored (and some other chances he had that didn’t go in) he can create for himself – a little run here, change the angle there, dip of the shoulder
DDB is very “flat footed” meaning with limited motion – the only time I see him score is when he’s already in front standing still and pounces on rebound or quick pass in or if he just runs in a straight line (like the goal vs Fene) and is there to again tap it in
Kule is a much better all-around striker/forward
Given Igor’s limited minutes – I would put Kule behind Budimir and Ivanovic – but ahead of DDB and Igor (until he gets minutes)
@ Maminjo
Great update on,“Patrik Schick got injured.”
Big time loss for Czechia.
Actually highlights how deep we are these days that we can have multiple top players out during WCQ, and still be dominant.
Schick is a beast and cannot be replaced for Czechia. However they still have quality and will run all night, especially in Prague.
I pray Modrić does not have to go the full 90 @ Juve next week.
Also be nice if doesn’t have do it going down a man.
He is looking sharp with Milan.
If we beat Czech on October 9, then we move ahead of them 3 points (6 really,because we have a game in hand against Gibraltar)…
and with two games left for each team, it would be impossible for Czechs to leapfrog us due to our +13 goal differential on them.
We could have World Cup wrapped up in less than two weeks from now.
x.com/Roncomps/status/1972417538974973965
Vuskovic won 18 aerial duels (out of 20) today
In H1, he won 13 of 15 aerial duels
You have to go back SEVEN YEARS to find a CB in a top 5 league who has had 18 (or more) aerial clearances in one game
Elite elite elite aerially ability
Perfect complement to Gvardiol’s attributes
Patrik Schick got injured yesterday.
He’s officially out for Czech’s games against Croatia and Faroe Islands.
Huge disadvantage for the Czech in these two difficult qualifiers.
We need to take advantage.
Yes, he did his hamstring towards the end of the match for Bayer Leverkusen against St Pauli. Reports suggest that he is out for at least 3 weeks.
We can only pray that none of our key players get injured in the coming days.
Plus Adam Hlozek is still out with a broken ankle, according to FotMob.
No excuses for us.
We need to take them out in Prague and close out this qualification campaign early.
Solid all around performance for Vuskovic. . . a very good game for Hamburg today against Union Berlin. He was clearly one of the better players on the field.
Sofascore had him as Man of the Match
Luka Tunjic scored for Fortuna this weekend in the Eredivisie. 19 years old. Has he elected to play for Croatia? If so, what is the story with Tunjic and what do we see as his potential?
Luka Sucic did not see the pitch for Real Sociedad in their loss to Barcelona today. It has been a terrible start for him, not playing for the Croatian national team or for Real Sociedad. Is a transfer in the next window a good idea? There are rumours AC Milan is among the Serie A teams interested in Luka Sucic . . . Would that be a good change of scenery? Joining Modric? How would Sucic fit into the AC Milan line up and style?
Luka Sucic is not getting any playing time in Milan. I hear the same complaints about him at Sociedad as I did at Redbull he walks to much doesn’t run enough. Not a good sign for his future as you never heard these complaints about Luka Rakitic Brozovic or Kovacic. Funny thing is Petar Sucic has run the most Kilometers whenever he has played for Inter.
That’s not good. Maybe it has to do with the injury he had before? Hopefully not and it’s just a mentality thing that he can adjust.
It’s a mentality thing. I remember Rakitic talked about how Félix Magaath at Shalke got him super fit changed his mentality and changed his career.
Difference is Rakitic was 19 when he moved to Schalke
Luka Sucic is already 23
Rakitic truly didn’t blossom until he went to Sevilla at 24 I believe. Schalke let him go for free as they did not believe in him. Rakitic was also known as a party guy early on in Schalke. Seen getting drunk quite a few times at Cajke concerts with his Serb teammate can’t remember his name.
I thought Vuskovic had a very solid first half.
Defensively he was sound, he won most of the air duels by far.
Even at 18 he is an imposing physical presence in the Bundesliga.
1:30pm EDT Sunday
Vuskovic starts
JJ not even on bench
Marin L on bench (how many minutes has he played this season?)
Juranović is injured. It’s unfortunate that Ljubičić doesn’t play. He was very effective in the minutes he played last season.
Was he really?
His first game vs. Hoffenheim he had a goal and an assist
After that nothing
He probably should have stayed in Austria/LASK (hindsight is always 20/20)
It’s not always stats on the scoreboard. It’s also the result the team gets with a certain player on the field.
Do we really need to put more pressure on Jagusic before the DZ game and interview him? He recognizes he needs to do better and isn’t happy with his season so far. But instead of interviews (which just put more pressure on him) he’s got to show it on the pitch
Too bad Grgic left you could tell he was really carrying him under his wing
https://sportske.jutarnji.hr/sn/nogomet/hnl/klubovi/slaven-belupo/mladi-vatreni-uoci-maksimira-ne-zalim-zbog-dinama-ponekad-u-zivotu-treba-razmisliti-i-povuci-mudre-poteze-15627073
Shock the world Jaga!
Roma 2nd goal
Give away by Verona in midfield
Soule looks over his shoulder at Bradaric – knows Bradaric isn’t going to be able to track back / beat him in a foot race – and goes to far post for the tap-in
Bradaric is not LB for Verona – he is playing in LWB as we know – but in reality – he is like a box to box #8 who happens to play on the left-side – in attack sometimes he drifts inside into half-space as a L#10 – but minimal real defensive responsibility
Not sure where exact Dalic would play him in the NT on the left-side – hard to tell if he’d be able to play LB in a NT back four – as he’s not responsible for defensive stuff for Verona
Got yanked at 84′
P.S. he isn’t really responsible for creating (didn’t see any dribbles or passing from him really) – not sure exactly what his role is going forward – kind of like being on the left side as an outlet – but the Verona forwards are all selfish and every chance they just took terrible shots or made terrible crosses
Watching a few minutes of Bradaric vs. Roma
Interesting – last game vs. Juventus he played on right-side
Dalic will probably appreciate this versatility (able to play left or right)
Correction vs. Juventus he was also left (cancel the versatility)
They just showed Mel Gibson in the crowd lol
He looks SO WASHED
To put Marco and Musa MLS in context
In 8 games / 640′ a washed Son has 8 goals and 3 assists for LA
Marco and Musa need to be scoring at least 1 goal per game from open play (Musa has tons of penalties) to even be considered for the NT imo
Strikers in the MLS are a no-go.
The top goal contributors list (goals or assists) is filled with guys who are uncapped or rarely ever capped for their National Teams. It’s like this every year.
Musa being among (but still not ahead) of guys who can’t even get caps for teams like Denmark or Serbia…is bad.
Musa should be far behind all of Budimir, Ivanovic, Matanovic, Beljo and Kulenovic right now.
He needs to move to Europe and score goals there.
Kulenović is looking like a very dangerous striker at any level. He’s always been agressive, but his technique and football intelligence have developed a lot over the past year. In an ideal world, I would plan to have all five of those strikers on the roster for the world cup and play with two strikers at all times. The problem is that there won’t be room for everyone when you factor in how many midfielders Dalić likes to carry (and not without reason). Also, we have Fruk who is a midfielder who can actually play well as a winger/striker.
Problem is Igor not playing much
Musa scoring against mannequin (all of the T fans are laughing at what a joke MLS is, saying every time Son gets the ball, it takes 5 seconds for a defender to close him down, hence all the goals)
Weird Dalic named Igor and Musa (on standby)
Maybe he’s still debating which of the two DZ strikers is better (based on what he’s looking for) and hasn’t decided yet
Based on performance, I’d vote Kule over DDB (as of now)
Soticek bench today
Since international break – 3 games – he’s only gotten 4′ total
And on the bench again today
***.transfermarkt.us/marin-soticek/leistungsdaten/spieler/945345
So much for break-out year at Basel
Sad
Anyone watching Pisa? Adrian Semper in net. 1-1 at HT. He made 2 saves
Buffon’s kid Louis is on the bench (he’s a 17 y/o winger)
Here are the Pandur highlights from y’day (he was a bit shaky and lucky once saved by the post, another you spilled the ball out but his CB saved it off the line, etc) – guess it was ok overall
***.youtube.com/watch?v=kl5B6C3pUeg
None of your links work!
lol – hopefully you can figure out what “***.” stands for?
SN are reporting that there is no UEFA meeting scheduled to ban Israel or their club sides from UEFA comps. Dinamo is heading to Serbia to play Maccabi on Thursday and UEFA has instructed that no visiting fans will be allowed to attend.
Hopefully BBB will not travel like they did a few years back to Athens when they were involved in running battles with AEK supporters.
Which genius decided the game should be in Serbia???
DZ (doubt it)? UEFA? Israel football federation? Maccabi? Red Star and/or Partizan ultras???
The stadium only has 4,500 capacity (are Red Star and Partizan fans allowed the attend???) and is that hybrid grass crap (the same pitch the NT played in Faroe Islands where all the players were spilling out)
On the face of it – this is a provocation towards the BBB – wouldn’t be surprised if they cross the boarder arrange to “meet” with Red Star and Partizan ultras (as opposed to Maccabi ultras) – this almost feels like a set up to make the BBB look bad and into conflict (they will be blamed for crossing the border – the Serbs will play victim)
Unreal stupidity
My guess is that Maccabi chose this, so it’s more of a “home” game for them (the enemy of my enemy is my friend).
But it’s still in Vojvodina, which is not as hardcore Serbian like Beograd is.
Agree – but the ultras can (and will) travel from Belgrade and blame the BBB
We know the BBB will see this as a clear provocation – is DZ just saying no tickets for away fans or that they can’t travel full-stop?
If just no tickets – that’s probably worse – as the BBB will just loiter in the city looking for trouble lol – if no travel – they’ll probably ignore as they feel disrespected by Maccabi (by choice of venue)
This could end up a real mess for Croatia – not sure how they plan to manage the BBB – they need to bribe them or something lol to keep them out of Serbia for the match
I’m still loving that goal which Matanovic scored couple of weeks ago coming off the bench against Stuttgart. His Black Forest team are up against Krama and Hoffenheim in a few hours from now. Here’s hoping our guys will leave their mark in this game…
Watched juventus and atalanta..the montenegro attackers from both teams are standout performers.
Good to see Sutalo start for Ajax and play the full 90 minutes. Great to see Kovacic on the bench for Man City after a lengthy injury break.
Baturina, P Sucic and Sosa never came on as subs. Majer came on in stoppage time for Wolfsberg.
I watched the whole Ajax game today.
Sutalo was superb. By far and away the best defender for Ajax.
Good heading clearances, confident and capable dribbling, superb long passes upfield . . . He anticipates attackers well, breaks up their plays . . . Barely an error in the whole game.
One scary moment at 92 minutes. He went down clutching the back of his knee after seeming to jam his leg . . . But he stayed on and finished the game and appeared fine for the last five minutes.
I watched him last season when he was excellent and today he was back to that form.
It was a command performance, stellar. He has Champions League this year with Ajax but he is surely off to a top five league next season.
Did anyone else see the game?
If so, what were your thoughts on Sutalo?
I know others want Gvardiol in the middle, but I would like to see Vuskovic and Sutalo in the middle for a qualifying game or for a friendly and see how they compliment each other. That would give us Stanisic on the right back and Gvardiol on the left . . . . We lack a little punch on the attack but Gvardiol gives us a dangerous attacking dimension up that left side . . . And I have seen Stanisic join the attack on the right for Bayern . . .
Anyway, almost an error free game from Sutalo. He looks like he has rounded into form after a bit of a slow start to the season because of that injury.
Good to hear that he played well. We need him to be in good form for the match against Chechia. Gvardiol of late has been playing as a CB for his club, so it will be interesting to see what Dalic will do ?
With Stanisic injured and Bayern complaining about him being even called up, the defence barring any injuries will most likely be Jakic, Sutalo, DCC and Gvardiol ?
I think that’s right.
Unless Dalic want to go Jakic at right, then Sutalo and Gvardiol in the middle, but then who would be your candidate at left back?
Sosa has gone backward in the last four years and he might have been the answer at one time, but the consensus here, I think, is no. He is just not in form.
Is there a really good option at the left if Gvardiol plays CB?
If not, it seems it is Jakic-Sutalo-DCC-Gvardiol . . .
Sosa isn’t called up (which is the right decision).
With Stanišić out, the backline will definitely be:
Gvardiol-Duje-Šutalo-Jakić
Bad news is Dalić didn’t call up any other LB/RB players… So he’s taking a pretty big risk expecting Gvardiol and Jakić to cover 180 minutes over the two games.
Second match is against Gibraltar in Varazdin so one would expect Dalic to rest most of our high-profile players like Gvardiol , Modric, Perisic etc. and give some of our fringe players a run.
But who would play in the LB and RB positions if Gvardiol and/or Jakić are given a rest?
Dalic literally called nobody up.
None of Sosa, Juranović, Bradarić, Smolčić or even Hrgović were called up as backups.
If he’s just going to go with an “All Centerback” lineup against Gibraltar…then it won’t allow us to test new players (like Vuskovic) with a proper backline that we would use in a real game. Fielding a cookie cutter lineup would also display the same arrogance that almost cost him the Faroe Islands game.
I don’t think he will rest Gvardiol or Jakic. I think they will play both games.
He did state that the standby callups would be used in case of injuries or changes in form. That means that he’s officially giving himself the opportunity to bring Smolčić in place of Stanišić, for example. I would not be concerned at all about defending the wings versus Gibraltar after seeing the first match. You could put Vušković, Pongračić, Moro, or Marco Pašalić in there and Croatia would still win. The match against Gibraltar will be treated as training for the guys who don’t play against Czechia, with winning the Czechia match being the clear priority next week.
When Gvardiol was subbed off, Pep was giving him a talking to on the sideline before he sat down.
Gvardiol yanked at 70′ with Ake replacing him
He had a hockey assist on the 2nd goal – nice cross/pass to Haaland heading it to Nunes for the strike/goal
Funny Palace leading Liverpool 1-0 w/ 25 min left – of course Sosa not playing – but would be funny if he comes on late (4 subs to go)
Jesús Rodríguez just got a straight red (can’t see clear contact on the replay)
But he’ll miss next 2 games (I guess?)
Maybe Bati will get a chance to play on the wing in his absence
Still waiting if Bati comes on here at the end as a mercy 5th sub w/ the game 1-1
Morato for Paz in 90′ as last sub
Poor Bati
Gvardiol starting – Kova returns to the bench!
Highlights FINALLY available of Jagusic’s brace (and Sivalec’s brace) vs. Kotoriba
***.youtube.com/watch?v=LTwFPaEOuHA
However, Anonymous is not happy that Jagusic was responsible for giving up the ball for the two goals that Gorica scored last week – instead of posting shirtless pics of his little frame (with his GF) he should be in the gym trying to build some mass (both upper and lower body) in order to increase his physicality
***.youtube.com/watch?v=mmSSpdGPRjw
1st goal – he looks over his shoulder THREE times as the cross came in and got punched out – he knew that the defender was right there – looked like he was scared he was going to get tackled hard by the defender and was scared what to do with the ball – he either should have gotten his body in between the ball and defender (which he does on 2nd goal, below) – and take a tackle to win a free kick – or use his fast feet for some smart creative move where he gets the ball out to the right side which is completely free (which he is capable of)
2nd goal – he learnt from 1st goal – and this time he was in between ball and defender looking for contact – and he got it – but maybe a bit overly flopped on the ground – and didn’t get the free kick call (probably he should have) – but in fairness he got right back up and tried to win the ball back
On both goals – it was Cabraja – who was bullying Jagusic – suspect he was bullying him from the first minute/all game – every chance he got – so by the time 26′ came around – he was in Jagusic’s head – as such – Jagusic needs to not only improve his physicality (gym work, not lounging by the pool work) – but needs to have answers how he will react to that going forward – otherwise he will get the reputation “Just go hard and bully Jagusic and we take him out of the game” – I know a red card was in the 40′ but he was pulled for the 2nd half
Hopefully he adjusts and we see improvement vs. DZ tomorrow
How come your links never work?
Is this an Ante thing or an Anonymous thing?