Darijo Srna you pwn the UEFA! (and the world)

Darijo Srna, the first Croat ever to lift the UEFA trophy as the skipper, tonight after his side Shakhtar Donetsk beat Werder Bremen in the last ever UEFA cup final, 2-1.

How proud you have made us, oh captain!

American Adventure

This blog is only temporarily on hiatus as I'm halfway through my big
American adventure.

A lot of things have been going on with the NT and our players, sadly
none of them were good :-(

Obviously I can't write in lengths at the moment but I'll just mention
that Niko's injury is actually much worse than we thought and his
season is over. He stands an off chance of playing vs Ukraine on June
6, (only our most important match this year!!!) but it's quite unlikely.

:-((

Who else is injured, oh yeah Ivica Krizanac broke his toe.
Rakitic is out too (basically our cover for Niko!), Eduardo is still
sidelines as well and even if he gets healthy by June, he won't be
match fit.
Apparently Stipe the goalie is out too.

:-((

Yeah I have nothing nice to say actually so I'll stop now.

I'm currently at West Virginia visiting my brother for his graduation.
I'm so proud of him! Spent the past 10 days in New York and loved it!
I'm coming back home next weekend so I'll talk more then.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Sent from iPhone

Poetry Time

Venice comes from the land of Cro
full of hot people, don't you know?
Niko, and Charlie and marina boys
I wish I could make them all my toys

Niko loves to read romance
when you see him, he'll put you in a trance-
he's smart, articulate and adorable;
people who hate him are truly deplorable!

Charlie Corluka is Croatian;
a fine export from his nation.
He loves pies and wants to be a waiter-
This career he could pursue later.

Brought to you by the creative wits of lovely Steph and Callie!

Niko has a boo boo :-(

This was supposed to be a happy post :-( but instead, this happened:



Niko got injured yesterday at the match with Bolton. He was excellent until that point, playing one of his best games this season. And then minute 77 happened, he was brought down in a bad tackle and hurt his left ankle. It looked horrible :-((



Of course, the initial speculations were way over the top, saying that he probably broke his ankle, which did nothing to ease my mind as you can guess. But soon after we got the news Niko was even able to walk a bit with no crutches so it's surely not as bad as it first looked. In fact, according to our NT doctors, he could be fit again in 10-20 days, depending on the extent of damage on his ligaments. And they'll know more after the MRI scan tomorrow.

I can't believe all the bad luck the boy's had this season! And just as he was getting his best form back, something like this happens :'-( poor Niko... Please footy gods, let him be OK!


Sad Niko is sad :-( I die :-(

In other news, Tottenham played Newcastle today and won 1-0. They were dominant throughout the match and basically toying with NU, but their end product simply wasn't there. Even the goal they scored was the result of a few lucky bounces, though credit to Bent, he used his chance well.

Both Luka and Charlie started the match as usual. Unfortunately, about half an hour in Dawson got injured in what eerily looked like a reprise of Niko's injury. He fell awkwardly and hurt his ankle, it looked really bad and he was obviously in a lot of pain :-(

According to the first news, they still don't know if it's a fracture or ligament damage and will have to wait for the checkup on Monday, but it doesn't look good...

Poor Michael, I quite like him. There's something childishly innocent about him, plus his committment is second to none. And such bad luck, he's been a replacement CB and the one break he gets, he gets injured :-(

So many sad faces to make today :-(

Luka played a great match again, as usual when they play at home - so that's one good news I can report I guess.

As for Charlie, he moved to CB after Daws was taken out, and Hutton was brought on as RB. Charlie seemed a bit absent minded to begin with, but he was doing alright until he switched to the center. He's had a few shaky moments there, even with Newcastle playing as poorly as they have. Well I can't say he's had a shocking game, but it was far from his brilliant performances in the recent few games.

Hutton however did well at RB, a few great crosses and seemed fresh, after being sidelined for long. Whatever Charlie may say, I've noticed awhile ago he just doesn't seem to be in it anymore when he has to play as centerback. And with King being selected whenever he's fit, I don't know where that leaves Charlie :-( not on the bench hopefully!


Fighting with the dark side.

Yeah, today is just one big sad face.

Match Report: Crondorra (Andorra Assimilated)

Ivan Klasnić gives good thigh. Also scores good goals.

Hopefully this is the last time I have to tag Andorra. I mean, it's nice to have an opponent in the group that you know for sure you're going to beat, but I never liked those guys, they're too keen. Of the aggressive kind. Everyone goes on how Andorra are the weakest team in Europe, because they're the last amateur NT as far as I know. But what they lack in technical aspect they compensate in fouls and provocations. In comparison, from what I've seen of Kazakhstan, they're twice more desirable opponent, they neither play well or try as much.

The match was rather boring, not helped by the frantic camera that reminded me much of the one at Fratton Park, the one that's level with players. Great for hottyspotting, but terrible for keeping up with football as you can't link the moves. And football is the most important when NT are playing.

The little bit of excitement sadly came from a few imbeciles who thought it was a great idea to throw flares to the pitch. Križanac almost got hit. They weren't even at the terraces, but at the top of this rock that's above the pitch. I don't think I need to point out they were our "supporters". Poor Andorrans must've seen the flares for the first time as they were baffled, so Stipe the goalie had to take care of it and throw them out.



I was a bit gutted to see Slaven having to plead with them to stop as the ref was threatening to cancel the match. Although I thought he should've sent a few of his assistants up there to kick some butt.

Meanwhile, England beat Ukraine 2-1, which suit us great as now we're in a good position to win that second place and qualify for the barrage. We just need to win the match in June, which is the most important match for us this year, and beat Belarus and we should be spot on.

The match, well it best be forgotten, but there were some positives after all:

• Three points!
• NT time!
• Clean shaven Niko, yummers!
  

And if I had to rate them, it would go like this:

Stipe - can't rate him as he had nothing to do, but I suppose I could give him a six for looking cute and that time he yelled at that Andorran player who ran into him on purpose.

Charlie - 5.5 I don't like him much at the moment, he was barely there. Didn't lose the ball or make mistakes, but his crosses were pretty bad and he kept trying his stupid little dribbles that lead to nothing. A little more respect Charlie, is all I'm asking.

Križanac / Vejić - 6 Our centerbacks did OK seeing that they had little to do.

Čale - 5 Did alright as a substitute in Romania, but with each match he's exposing himself as not up to the NT standard. Couldn't link up with Rakitić well, kept losing the ball and was probably the weakest link. Any remotely more serious opponent and we could've been in trouble. It's hard to believe he was once first pick over Charlie. Bring back Pranjić!

Srna - 6 Well he tried. He ran. And put in some crosses. And looked angry enough arguing with the flare throwing guys. I think the armband's doing him good, mentality wise.

Jurić - 5 Not impressed with this guy. He was a waste of space in my opinion, and I can't figure out how come he gets the pick over Vukojević or even Pokrivač. Granted it's only his second match but I don't think it'll work out.

Niko - 6.5 He was playing a central role but sitting quite deep - reminding me much of Xabi. He was quite good at it, except the whole midfield couldn't really string them passes together in such a packed area. He was giving directions to the centerbacks as well, and actually put in a couple of dedicated tackles. I like this new side of him. He ran quite a lot as well!

Rakitić - 6 Off color, but I'd cut him some slack because, well it just didn't seem to be working. Also, it wasn't his fault that he had a back up in Čale.

Klasnić - 7 A goal and an assist, and a lovely goal it was. I'm always chuffed for him in particular, for everything he's been through.

Eduardo - 6 Scored so yay, but it could've been ruled out for dangerous play - there was no contact with the goalie, but his leg was high up and in his direction after all. Also, while pushing over that mouthy Andorran might've been hot, it got him in the books and it's the last thing we need before Ukraine.

Match Preview: Andorra vs Croatia

I'm so bored. The international week started last weekend and as much as I love NT gatherings, it's been so boring and uneventful this time. Sure there are some pics and cute clips from training, but as they have too much private time on their hands, and they are sinisterly, well, private about it, that doesn't leave me with much. How inconvenient.

Also, we could've easily played two matches within these ten days, a friendly and an official, like most other teams, so I don't understand how come our team took 10 days off to prepare for Andorra exclusively? Really? And now they're wasting time doing nothing. Playstation and fussball and Seinfeld re-runs. Yes, that's how they're spending most of their afternoons.

Don't get me wrong, I love it when they just hang about casually, and it's probably for the better that they aren't playing anyone else until Wednesday as so many of our first team players are injured (Olić, Petrić, Pranjić, Mandžukić are definitely out, Luka is doubtful and Slaven probably won't risk him, Charlie is being mended as we speak).

But surely Slaven didn't know that when they were arranging the match schedule. They gave up on a friendly in November as it was 'pointless', and they've wasted this term now as well. I don't understand.

Well anyway, this is most likely the team that will run out vs Andorra*:

* yes I stole this from another forum...

And this is where they'll be playing:


The capacity is about 1200, but far more important than that is the state of the pitch which is not fit for professional football. But as it happens, Andorrans refused our offer to play at Nou Camp instead, even though they did so with England - in other words, "who the f**k are you?" Ah well. They deserve a good stuffing anyway.

Some stats: We played Andorra in three qualifying rounds so far, and have a pretty good goal difference, 22-0. That's 4,4 goals per match - hopefully this means there'll be a goleada on Wednesday as well.

What to say about them? Hack'n'slash really. I noticed at the last match their #7 had some ball skills but all in all, it should be easy peasy. The only concern is none of the guys get hurt due to the bad pitch conditions.

His kung fu is better than yours.

If there was ever any doubt Joe owned the world, this should quickly dispel it.
I can't tell you how much I love him.