Triglav come out swinging and Olimpija get intimate with the back of the net…

So, spring has arrived (for the purposes of the Prva Liga), and an uneventful transfer window came and went.  Over the weekend we were back to business as usual: Maribor rolled into Kranj with an imperious and surely unassailable 12 point league carried over the winter. Time for a gentle run-out against bottom of the table Triglav – stretch the muscles out get a bit of scoring practice in, ready for their steam-rollering of the rest of the campaign.

Except Triglav Kranj had other ideas. Like a bear waking from hibernation a long way from a box of paracetamol, the boys at the bottom bared their teeth at the first bit of 2012 action. A pretty respectable crowd turned out at Kranj’s ‘modestly’ sized ground to see Anže Jelar open the scoring for the hosts just before the half hour. Jelar benefited from Nejc Potokar’s uncanny impression of a swing door in the Maribor defence that caused Jasmin Handanovič to spot the ball coming at him late, too late.

Žan Pelko performed a heart-in-mouth-highwire-spectacular in the Kranj goal, but he managed to prove that, even if it isn’t pretty, keeping the ball out of the net is all that matters when you’re the underdog.  Kranj were awake, alive in the spring sunshine, and if the first goal was a moment of cheek, the second was something special from Enis Đurkovič (about 1:09 here). Teams at the top of the table would do well to take note of this study into how to unlock the Maribor defence. No doubt if manager Darko Milanič gets his way it won’t happen again. Maribor managed to get a consolation goal long after the 90 minute mark passed, but they’re left to reflect on a game that they could, and should, have got something from.

Another team to fare better after the break were Olimpija, who showed no festive sluggishness at all when they destroyed Nafta in Prekmurje. Dare Vršič (who else) opened the floodgates from the penalty spot 8 minutes into the game. Nafta may have felt a little hard done by, the deep furrow carved outside the area by Saša Levačič’s clumsy tackle being pretty decent proof that a free-kick was probably the right shout.  Them’s the breaks; Levačič was shown red and Olimpija chalked a one on the board. The man of the day was surely Dejan Djermanovič who scored a hat-trick on his debut, a bright start for both him and Olimpija for the second half of the season, although, even with their loss, Maribor look too far ahead already. Olimpija may have to settle for second. Djermanovič has already scored one more goal for Olimpija than he did in 9 games for Litex Lovech in the first half of the season.

Gorica are the team with the most opportunity to pip Olimpija for the silver medal spot, although they suffered a shaky start to a Celje team they looked far ahead of for the first 30 minutes of the match. Comfortably ahead through Sandi Arčon after eight minutes, Gorica eventually lost their advantage to a 42^nd minute penalty. Celje managed to keep things under control and stifled Gorica to a 1:1 draw.

So, the first games after the winter-break turned out like this:

Rudar 1:2 Mura 05

Domžale 1:0 Luka Koper

Nafta 0:6 Olimpija

Gorica 1:1 Celje

Triglav 2:1 Maribor

 

This weekend’s fixtures (all times CET):

Saturday:

Celje v. Nafta (15:00)

Maribor v. Domžale (16:00)

Koper v. Gorica (18:00)

Sunday:

Mura 05 v. Triglav Kranj (15:00)

Olimpija v. Rudar Velenje (15:00)