![]() The fire of course is the passion he instils, which goes a long way to make them competitive, the ice is the stare he gives when a player steps outside the “plan” and makes a mistake. In fact if you show any talent at all at this “nursery” club, you are instantly spirited away across the border to a “big budget” club.Īnd yet there are times when you get the feeling that his coaching which is the equivalent of “A Song of Fire and Ice” is doing more damage than good. Not so now, youth is the key and the new names keep coming. If you peruse the team sheet from my first sojourn in Zagreb, the names read like a who’s who of top class talent.īalic, Kopljar, Strlek, Sego et al are long a distant memory. Young players need that discipline, it could be argued. Still athletic and strong, he appears, to the outside eye, to rule with the rod. Even in advancing years he holds an aura about him, a power that emanates from every pore in his body. I chose the number 9 to wear on my jersey for club and country because of a photo I once saw of VV in the perfect shooting pose. I’ve always had a fascination with the man. It is the curse of any great club that you are judged on past glories, but the “game of thrones” surrounding Zagreb was becoming farcical. Like him or loathe him, Veselin Vujovic is doing something that has evaded the long list of coaches that have inhabited the throne room of Zagreb. The arena is filling up again, the crowds are expectant and the team, always a Croatian creation is inspiring the hordes of handball lovers. Now there is a confidence, a renaissance of sorts being led by a Montenegrin man-mountain. ![]() Ignominious failure, lack of budget and dwindling crowds had appeared to signal the death-knell of a once great team. The club with more name changes than a con-man selling beach front property in Miami, is once again being touted among the top teams in Europe. The team that was once at the forefront of European handball is experiencing a revival at present. That is all about to change and I am really looking forward to going back. We joke about it now and I count Ante as a great raconteur, a great dinner companion and we laugh about the first time we met, but I have always batted away his requests that I return to Zagreb. After the game, which they won, Ante drilled me on the rules of cricket (as if an Irishman would know), then we discussed handball and he never invited me to dinner. He probably wasn’t wrong, but it was an inauspicious start and end to my relationship with Zagreb. “But you’re Irish, what do you know about handball?” I remember his first words to me as if they were uttered yesterday: Once upon a time, many years ago, 28th of November 2011, to be exact, a young Irish man walked into Arena Zagreb and was hailed by a certain Ante Antic, mogul, maestro and general all round good guy at Zagreb.
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