Boško Balaban
Balaban playing for Dinamo Zagreb in 2008
Personal information
Full name Boško Balaban[1]
Date of birth (1978-10-15) 15 October 1978
Place of birth Rijeka, SR Croatia,
SFR Yugoslavia
Height 1.83 m (6 ft 0 in)
Position(s) Striker
Senior career*
Years Team Apps (Gls)
1995–2000 Rijeka 97 (21)
2000–2001 Dinamo Zagreb 27 (14)
2001–2003 Aston Villa 8 (0)
2002–2003 → Dinamo Zagreb (loan) 24 (15)
2003–2007 Club Brugge 118 (58)
2007–2009 Dinamo Zagreb 37 (17)
2009–2012 Panionios 54 (13)
2012–2015 Selangor 30 (12)
Total 398 (150)
International career
1994 Croatia U-15 3 (0)
1995 Croatia U-16 1 (0)
1995 Croatia U-17 2 (1)
1996 Croatia U-18 1 (0)
1996–1997 Croatia U-19 4 (0)
1996–1997 Croatia U-20 1 (1)
1997–2000 Croatia U-21 17 (4)
2000–2007 Croatia 35 (10)
*Club domestic league appearances and goals

Boško Balaban (born 15 October 1978) is a Croatian former footballer who played as a striker. Balaban also played for the Croatia national team.

Club career

Early career

Born in Rijeka, he started playing for local club HNK Rijeka and appeared in 97 matches between 1995 and 2000, scoring a total of 21 goals. During the 1999–2000 season, he was the top scorer of his team with 15 goals and attracted the attention of another Croatian club, Dinamo Zagreb. Playing for Dinamo, Balaban kept up his goalscoring form and once again became the league's top scorer with 14 goals in 25 games. Two games into the following season, he was signed by Aston Villa for a fee of £5.8 million, earning a £20,000-a-week contract.[2]

Aston Villa

Balaban failed to find any form for Aston Villa, making just nine appearances, seven as a substitute, in two and a half years.[2] He was loaned back to Dinamo Zagreb for the 2002–03 season, scoring 15 times in 24 appearances. In December 2003, Aston Villa released Balaban from his contract and he signed for Club Brugge on a free transfer.[2]

Balaban is regularly cited as one of the worst Premier League signings of all time.[3] In a 2019 interview with FourFourTwo, Balaban disputed this, arguing that Aston Villa never gave him an opportunity to play: "If you’re a club that throws big money at signings and then doesn’t let them actually play, the jokes should really be at your expense."[4]

Club Brugge

In the 2004–05 season, Balaban scored 25 goals in 24 appearances for Club Brugge; in the 2005–06 season, he scored 27 goals in 30 games for Brugge. In August 2007, Balaban went back to Dinamo after Brugge had bought the top scorer François Sterchele. Balaban stated he would miss Brugge very much and he had a wonderful time at the club. He earned the nickname amongst Brugge fans of "Super Bosko", due to him scoring four times in one match and scoring at an average of 0.5 goals per match.

Dinamo Zagreb

During Balaban's time at Dinamo Zagreb, he had an incident with fascist salute, which he made to fans after scoring a goal against Inter Zapresic. He had to pay a fine of 100KN (around €14).[5]

Panionios

In June 2009, Panionios signed Balaban on a three-year contract. Balaban scored eight goals and he was Panionios' first scorer for the Super League 2009–10.

Selangor FA

On 29 January 2012, Malaysian Super League team Selangor FA signed Balaban for an undisclosed fee. He debuted, and scored the winning goal in the game against league leaders Kelantan FA on 14 February 2012, Selangor winning 2–1.[6][7]

After helping Selangor to qualify for the 2013 AFC Cup, Balaban's contract was not extended after a mutual agreement.[8]

International career

Balaban won 35 international caps for Croatia between 2000 and 2007, scoring ten goals. His debut came in a friendly match against Slovakia on 16 August 2000,[9] after being a regular member of the Croatian under-21 team for more than a year. His debut proved successful, as he scored Croatia's only goal in a 1-1 draw.

Balaban excelled during Croatia's qualifying campaign for the 2002 FIFA World Cup, appearing in all eight matches and scored five goals, including a hat-trick against Latvia in a 4–1 victory on 24 March 2001. He was also in the Croatia squad at the final 2002 World Cup tournament, but spent all three group matches on the bench. He subsequently did not appear in any matches for Croatia between February 2003 and August 2004, missing the entire Euro 2004 qualifying campaign as well as the final tournament. He made his competitive comeback against Bulgaria on 9 October 2004 in the Croatia team's qualifying campaign for the 2006 FIFA World Cup and subsequently appeared in another four qualifying matches, scoring a brace against Iceland on 3 September 2005. He was also a squad member at the 2006 World Cup finals, but once again spent all three group matches on the bench.

In early September 2006, Croatia manager Slaven Bilić dropped Balaban, along with teammates Ivica Olić and Dario Srna, from the squad for their opening Euro 2008 qualifier against Russia because of a late-night party in a Zagreb disco. However, Balaban was the only one of the three players to return to the squad for the very next qualifier against Andorra one month later, which Croatia won 7-0. Coming on as a substitute an hour into the match, and with Croatia 5–0 up, Balaban subsequently scored the fastest-ever goal by a single player for the Croatia national team, scoring just 20 seconds after coming onto the pitch.

Personal life

In November 2023, Balaban was jailed for one year after failing to pay child support to his ex-wife.[10]

Career statistics

Club

Source:[11]
Appearances and goals by club, season and competition
Club Season League Cup League Cup Continental Total
DivisionAppsGoalsAppsGoalsAppsGoalsAppsGoalsAppsGoals
HNK Rijeka 1995–96 Prva HNL 3000––30
1996–97 Prva HNL 19110––201
1997–98 Prva HNL 26120––281
1998–99 Prva HNL 23420––254
1999–2000 Prva HNL 291631–203417
Total 1002281002011023
Dinamo Zagreb 2000–01 Prva HNL 251435–403219
2001–02 Prva HNL 2100–0021
Total 27153500403420
Aston Villa 2001–02 Premier League 800000–80
Dinamo Zagreb 2002–03 Prva HNL 24152300403018
Club Brugge 2003–04 Belgian First Division 0000000000
2004–05 Belgian First Division 2293010843413
2005–06 Belgian First Division 30131011834017
2006–07 Belgian First Division 291664–534023
Total 834010421211011655
Dinamo Zagreb 2007–08 Prva HNL 181142–612814
2008–09 Prva HNL 13634–922512
Total 311776001535326
Panionios 2009–10 Super League Greece 24831––279
2010–11 Super League Greece 26410––274
Total 50124100005413
Selangor FA 2012 Liga Super 20122184–279
Career total 34313335211054613434172

International appearances

Source:[12]
Croatia
YearAppsGoals
200031
200195
200220
200310
200430
200562
200662
200750
Total3510

International goals

#DateVenueOpponentScoreResultCompetition
116 August 2000Tehelné pole, Bratislava, Slovakia Slovakia0–11–1Friendly
224 March 2001Gradski vrt, Osijek, Croatia Latvia1–04–12002 FIFA World Cup qualification
32–0
43–0
52 June 2001Stadion Varteks, Varaždin, Croatia San Marino2–04–0
66 June 2001Skonto Stadions, Riga, Latvia Latvia0–10–1
73 September 2005Laugardalsvöllur, Reykjavík, Iceland Iceland1–11–32006 FIFA World Cup qualification
81–2
923 May 2006Ernst Happel Stadion, Vienna, Austria Austria1–41–4Friendly
107 October 2006Maksimir Stadium, Zagreb, Croatia Andorra6–07–0UEFA Euro 2008 qualifying

Honours

Dinamo Zagreb

Club Brugge

Individual

References

  1. ↑ Hugman, Barry J., ed. (2002). The PFA Footballers' Who's Who 2002/2003. Queen Anne Press. p. 27. ISBN 9781852916480.
  2. 1 2 3 Fifield, Dominic (4 December 2003). "Balaban's contract terminated by Villa". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 4 September 2012.
  3. ↑ Edgar, Bill (18 July 2007). "The 50 worst transfers". The Times. London. Archived from the original on 27 July 2008. Retrieved 7 May 2010.
  4. ↑ "What's it like to be a big-money flop? Five players who've been there tell FourFourTwo..." FourFourTwo. FourFourTwo. 22 January 2019. Archived from the original on 26 January 2019. Retrieved 10 January 2020.
  5. ↑ "JOE's Forgotten Footballers: Boško Balaban". Joe. Retrieved 6 March 2017.
  6. ↑ Zulhilmi Zainal (14 February 2012). "Selangor 2–1 Kelantan: Bosko Balaban proves he is worth the wait". Goal.com. Retrieved 21 February 2012.
  7. ↑ K. RAJAN (15 February 2012). "Bosko starts with a bang". The Star. Archived from the original on 18 February 2012. Retrieved 21 February 2012.
  8. ↑ "Irfan ikat bekas peledak Croatia" (in Malay). bharian.com.my. Archived from the original on 21 February 2014. Retrieved 9 February 2013.
  9. ↑ "Player Database". EU-football. Retrieved 5 June 2022.
  10. ↑ "Forgotten Premier League star Bosko Balaban JAILED for failing to pay child support to Miss Croatia ex-wife". Talksport. 15 November 2023. Retrieved 16 November 2023.
  11. ↑ "Boško Balaban Dinamo statistics". povijest.gnkdinamo.hr. Archived from the original on 9 October 2017. Retrieved 8 October 2017.
  12. ↑ "BOŠKO BALABAN". hns-cff.hr. Retrieved 8 October 2017.
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