Dinamo Zagreb take on the visitors Hajduk Split in the round 1 match of Croatian National League. The match will be played on Friday, July 21st at Stadion Maksimir (Zagreb).
Dinamo Zagreb remains the flagship of Croatian football. Even during the time of unified Yugoslavia, the Blues repeatedly won both the championship title and the national cup. Currently, they enjoy almost undisputed dominance in Croatian club football. Since 2005, they have only once slipped to the 2nd place in the 2016/2017 season, unexpectedly finishing behind Rijeka. However, they quickly reclaimed the top position and have since kept everyone else at bay. However, they will now have to start a new cycle without one of their leaders, Livakovic. Dominic has been consistently good and seemed likely to leave after a successful World Cup for himself and the national team. But he stayed and even played a clean sheet in the Super Cup last weekend. Nonetheless, the 9 million from Fenerbahce became a compelling argument for parting ways with the goalkeeper.
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Hajduk Split will try to finally claim the top spot in the country. The Masters from the Sea were established back in the early 20th century and won their first championship title in 1927. In post-war Yugoslavia, they were stronger and more successful than their eternal rival from Zagreb. However, in the times of independence, they gradually lost their advantage to their opponent. The last time they won the gold in Croatia was in 2005. But they often secure the 2nd place, as was the case in the previous season when they also won the cup for the 2nd consecutive time, marking their 17th cup victory overall (including the Yugoslav era). Of course, they hope to change that now, and to achieve it, they made significant changes to their squad (Subasic retired, Nikola Kalinic was let go, and they signed new foreign players such as Dayaku and Odzhidzha-Ofoe). However, the new season started with a 0-1 loss to Maximir - their only goal was scored by Baturina in the 2nd half.
Head-to-head meetings have shown an interesting pattern. The 1-0 result in the Super Cup continues a trend where victories for Dinamo and draws alternate in the last 7 head-to-head matches. It’s logical that Dinamo will be the favorite, playing at home. However, it will be a tough match, so betting on total goals under 2.0 seems like a reasonable option.
Prediction for the match: Under 2.0 scored goals.
