GNK Dinamo Zagreb
| Dinamo's Logo | |||
| Full name | Nogometni Klub Dinamo Zagreb | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Nickname(s) | "plavi","modri" | ||
| Founded | 1945 | ||
| Ground | Maksimir Stadium, Zagreb, Croatia | ||
| Capacity | 38,923 | ||
| Chairman |  Mirko Barišić | ||
| Manager | Branko Ivanković | ||
| League | Prva HNL | ||
| 2006-07 | Prva HNL, Champions | ||
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Dinamo is one of the most famous and successful Croatian football clubs. Dinamo is based in Zagreb, the capital city of Croatia.
History
After WWII following the rise to power of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, three very popular Zagreb football clubs (HAŠK, Građanski, Concordia) were disbanded overnight, and a municipal club was formed on June 9 1945. Like other football clubs outside Croatia in Eastern Europe, it was also called Dinamo ("Dynamo"), and all the best and prospective Građanski players immediately joined the newly formed club. The newly formed club played at the old stadium of HAŠK, while most of the players were from Građanski, a number of outstanding players were forced to join Partizan Belgrade (Stjepan Bobek, Miroslav Meho Brozović, Franjo Glaser and Florijan Matekalo)[1]. At least one of them, for whom it is claimed that was forced to play for Partizan, moved to Belgrade by his own will - Stjepan Bobek[2]. Florijan Matekalo was coach of FK Partizan and later lived and died in Serbia even after split up beetwen Croatia and Yugoslavia. Franjo Glaser already played for the BSK Belgrade before the World War II. Only Miroslav Brozović, born in Herzegovina, claimed that he was forced to play for Partizan[3] although he himself wanted to move to BSK Belgrade before the World War II. Therefore, it can be suspected that such statements is just modern anticommunist propaganda.
It is often incorrectly associated with HAŠK (Hrvatski akademski športski klub, Translated: Croatian Academic Sports Club), formed on November 6 1903 as a students' club.
Márton Bukovi, the former Građanski manager, continued to work at Dinamo together with masseur Franjo Žlof, also a former Građanski player. Of the HAŠK players that transferred to Dinamo, the regulars in the first team were Ratko Kacian, Željko Čajkovski, Svetozar Peričić and Dragutin Lojen. Only Čajkovski remained in Maksimir for a longer period, for a total 11 years. The newly formed club also took Građanski's blue colours and from 1969 onwards, the club's emblem was very similar to that of Građanski's.
The club controversially changed its name to HAŠK-Građanski in 1992, and another name change followed in 1993, when the club was renamed to Croatia Zagreb. The name change was widely seen as a political move by the leadership of then newly independent Croatia, with the goal of distancing the club, and the entire country, from its Communist past. The name change was also never accepted by the club's true fans and they kept calling the club Dinamo through all those years in which they faced numerous fights with the Police which were sparked by their continuous cheering for Dinamo and not for HAŠK-Građanski or later Croatia-Zagreb. At this point it has to be said that in the last season of the Yugoslav Football championship, Dinamo's true fans in an act of patrotism were cheering for Građanski. The names Hašk-Građanski (which is illogical because it means, Croatian academic sports club - Club of the commons (literally citizens), was never accepted even by those who remembered the old clubs HAŠK and Građanski it was an illogical symbiosis of two rival clubs into one, although Dinamo was continuing the tradition of both clubs. In the years of growing repression (this time unfortunately by the Croatian leadership) the name Dinamo once again became the symbol of resistance, as it was during the time of Yugoslavia. The name Dinamo, which never left the Bad Blue Boys' banners, it also was the cause of many fights with the police, the "Holy name" as its considered by the Bad Blue Boys, officially returned to Maksimir on February 14, 2000. How far the bad Blue Boys have gone to promote the fight for the name Dinamo shows the banner written in Japanese which said "Holy name Dinamo", which was displayed on their northern grandstand in the late 1990s, when the Japanese football star Miura was playing for the club.
In the late 1990s, the club played two consecutive seasons in the UEFA Champions League group stage. In the 1998-99 season, they were drawn to a group with Ajax Amsterdam, Olympiacos and FC Porto. After disappointing performances in the first three matches in which they managed one draw against Ajax at home and lost their away matches against Olympiacos and Porto, they performed well in the remaining three matches, beating Porto at home and Ajax away, and drawing to Olympiacos at home. However, they failed to advance to the quarterfinals with a second-place finish behind Olympiacos. In the 1999-2000 season, they were in a group with defending champions Manchester United, Olympique de Marseille and Sturm Graz, but managed only a fourth-place finish in the group with two draws and one win. They most notably held Manchester United to a goalless draw at Old Trafford in their opening Champions League match that season.
They subsequently participated three times in the third qualifying round for the Champions League, in 2000, 2003 and 2006. However, they played against AC Milan, Dynamo Kyiv and most recently Arsenal FC and failed to win a single match, losing 6-1 on aggregate to AC Milan and 5-1 on aggregate to Dynamo Kiev and Arsenal. Throughout the first half of the 2000s decade, they had some international success in the UEFA Cup as they advanced to the second round of the competition three times and also played in the group stage of the competition in the 2004-05 season, but managed only a fourth-place finish in competition with VfB Stuttgart, SL Benfica and SC Heerenveen, only leaving KSK Beveren behind. Their last UEFA Cup appearance in the 2006-07 season of the competition ended in the first round with a 5-2 defeat to Auxerre on aggregate. Their best UEFA Cup result since the Croatian independence was in the 1997-98 season, when they advanced to the third round and were eliminated with a narrow 2-1 defeat to Atlético Madrid on aggregate.
Team honours
National honours
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International honours
Stadium
Dinamo's home ground is Maksimir Stadium, which is situated in the northeast borough of the city of Zagreb (called Maksimir) next to the famous Maksimir Park (forest) and the Zagreb Zoo. Currently, the stadium has 37,168 seats and is in the process of being renovated and rebuilt. When rebuilding finishes, it will have capacity of 60.000 seats, all covered.
Supporters
Although Dinamo has had a large army of followers throughout its history, its first organized group of followers emerged in 1986 in Split. The most hardcore and faithful followers, copying similar groups abroad, formed the Bad Blue Boys. As legend has it, the name was inspired by then very popular 1983 film Bad Boys starring Sean Penn.
Throughout the Zagreb boroughs, BBB chapters emerged, and at the matches one could see banners from various parts of the city (like Maksimir, Travno, and Dugave). At first, the supporters privately organized visits to the games in former Yugoslavia. They were present at Dinamo's matches in Belgrade, Sarajevo, Ljubljana, Niš, Podgorica, and Skopje.
At the start of the 1990s, the first organized BBB Fan Club was established and quickly became popular despite various problems.
Dinamo youth school - ONS Hitrec - Kacian
Dinamo's football school Hitrec - Kacian is named after two football greats from Zagreb.
Ico Hitrec, centre-forward from HAŠK is widely considered to be the greatest Croatian player before World War II. He became a legend after scoring twice against then famous Spanish keeper Ricardo Zamora during the first night game in the capital of Croatia between HAŠK Zagreb and Real Madrid in 1913. As on of the first Croatian international players, he went on to play for Grasshopper-Club Zürich of Switzerland, and Kicker, at the time the foremost sports journal in Europe, chose him as a member of the European elite 11. He was also the first technical officer and in his office in Zagreb power-works in Gundulićeva Street, the best players from Građanski met and discussed forming a new club with blue shirts.
Ratko Kacian played with Hitrec and won the title with HAŠK in 1938. Ten years later, he was a member of the team that won Dinamo its first Championship title.
The current director of the school is Mirko Jozić.
Dinamo in international competitions (2006/2007)
Champions League
Ekranas 1:4 Dinamo Zagreb
1:0 Eduardo Alves da Silva (7), 1:1 Lukšys (14), 1:2 Buljat (32), 1:3 Eduardo Alves da Silva (52), 1:4 Vugrinec (69)
Dinamo Zagreb 5:2 Ekranas
1:0 Ljubojević (7), 2:0 Vukojević (48), 3:0 Ljubojević (62), 3:1 Savenas (65), 3:2 Lukšys (69), 4:2 Vugrinec (89), 5:2 Ljubojević(90)
0:1 Fabregas (63), 0:2 Van Persie (65), 0:3 Fabregas (79)
Current squad
Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.
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Squad changes prior and during the 2007/2008 season
In:
Tomislav Šokota - signed from FC Porto (free transfer)
Did'dy Guela - signed from Kerkyra FC (free transfer)
Georg Koch - signed from MSV Duisburg (free transfer)- Mario Mandžukić - signed from NK Zagreb
- Ivica Vrdoljak - signed from NK Zagreb
Osmar - signed from Fluminense (free transfer)- Boško Balaban - signed from Club Brugge
Out:
- Anderson Costa - loaned to Aris FC
- Mario Grgurović - loaned to NK Inter Zaprešić
Saško Pandev - loaned to NK Inter Zaprešić
Patrice Kwedi - loaned to NK Inter Zaprešić- Tomislav Vranjić - loaned to NK Inter Zaprešić
- Marko Šarlija - loaned to NK Inter Zaprešić
- Dario Zahora - loaned to NK Domžale
- Marko Janjetović - signed for NK Međimurje (free transfer)
- Eduardo - signed for Arsenal F.C.
- Ivan Turina - signed for Skoda Xanthi (free transfer)
- Osmar - loaned to NK Inter Zaprešić
- Vedran Ćorluka - signed for Manchester City F.C.
Notable former players
Croatian
Foreigners
Željko Adžić- Eddie Krnčević
- Mark Viduka
Branko Strupar- Jens Nowotny
Željko Petrović
Hernán Medford
Kazuyoshi Miura- Goce Sedloski
Edin Mujčin
Selected former coaches
Arthur Gaskell
Márton Bukovi:1945-47, 1960-61- Milan Antolković
- Branko Zebec
- Vlatko Marković
- Miroslav Blažević
- Josip Skoblar:1988-89
- Otto Barić
- Velimir Zajec
- Zlatko Kranjčar
- Josip Kuže
- Marijan Vlak
Osvaldo Ardiles
