In the history of football, there are many cases when a football player, unknown in his homeland, shows himself in foreign teams. After that, offers from other clubs come in and, like an apotheosis, an invitation to the national team. It is to such athletes that our hero belongs.
Croatian beginning
On April 13, 1979, Ivica Krizhanac was born - a football player whose biography begins in Zagreb. Croatian clubs do not have a high level of play, because many of them serve as a springboard for the outflow of fairly good athletes to more “football” countries. But they provide good practice for the younger generation of players. One of these young players was Ivica Krizhanac, who began his professional career at the age of eighteen.
With an increase of 189 centimeters and a weight of almost 80 kilograms, he staked out for himself the place of the central defender. Despite the metropolitan origin, his first team was Sibenik from the city of the same name. Having played only seven matches for this team, the next season, Ivica started in the Slaven Belupo team from Koprivnitsa. But here it went wrong - only eight matches. However, in 1999 he was expected to move to Varteks from Varazdin. And again, only five matches in the 1999/2000 season.
The birth of a football player
Not succeeding in the open spaces of his native Croatia, Ivica Krizhanac changed “Varteks” to Czech “Jablonec 97”. Having played only one match for this club, he almost instantly joined the long-term leader of the Czech championship - Prague Sparta. For two years, the footballer played for the main team only two matches, while managing to become the Czech champion. But in the Czech capital he managed to work with good specialists - Ivan Gashek and Yaroslav Grzhebik, so his stay here was quite useful.
The next country for Ivica was Poland, and the team - Zabrzhevsky “Gurnik”, where the player moved in early 2002. Here he was already registered at the base, playing in thirteen matches before the end of the season and managing to score one goal. Therefore, it is not surprising that the next club in Ivica was another Polish club - "Discobolism" from Grodzinsk. Ivica Krizhanac spent three incomplete years on this team, becoming one of the team leaders and earning a captain's armband. In the UEFA Cup 2003/04, this modest Polish club outplayed well-known rivals - the German Hertha and the English Manchester City. In the same year, the Polish club won the silver medal of the championship. Here Ivitsa was noticed by breeders of St. Petersburg Zenith.
In the Zenith and Zenith
But the transition to the club from St. Petersburg was carried out in 2005.
For six years in the composition of “Zenith” only in the championship of Russia Ivica Krizhanac spent exactly one hundred matches. A total of one hundred forty-seven Croatian performances for the Russian club. As part of the St. Petersburg “Zenith” Ivica Krizhanac won his main trophies. Twice was the champion of Russia, once - a bronze medalist. He became the owner of the Cup and
Super Cup of Russia, won the Cup and
Super Cup of UEFA. At the same time, he was a full-fledged player in the club’s main team from St. Petersburg. It was the excellent performances for Zenit that Ivica Krizhanac owes to the fact that his talent was discerned in the coaching staff of the Croatian national team and invited to play for the team of his country. He played a few matches for the national team - only eleven, scoring one goal. But he was noticed quite late - almost at the age of thirty.
Retirement
Having added gold medals to the Cup of Russia in 2010, Ivica Krizhanac started the next season with a Hajduk player from his native Split. In the first year, the team won the bronze medals of the Croatian championship. The new captain of the split team was Ivica Krizhanac. A close-up photo of the athlete is below.
The player has been a member of this Croatian club for three years, until he decided in 2014 to end his active football career.