Andy Buckley
England’s Euro 2008 qualifying hopes and Steve McLaren’s managerial career were dramatically ended by one man last November; a 27-year-old Croatian by the name of Mladen Petric.
He single-handedly put any hope England had of reaching the Euro 2008 finals to bed with a sublime 25-yard strike in the 77th minute to secure a 3-2 win for Croatia. Apparently, Petric refused to swap shirts at the end of the game stating that it was the proudest moment of his career and he didn’t want to swap his shirt for anything and who can blame him.
As well as sending England tumbling out of the competition, Petric’s goal subjected England to their first defeat at the new Wembley. Although not directly responsible, Petric’s winner exposed some fundamental flaws in English football and sent its infrastructure into crisis. As a nation wept, the Borussia Dortmund forward and his compatriots finished as group winners and qualified for Euro 2008 along with Russia.
Although Petric claims Croatian nationality, he was born in Bosnia though he moved to Croatia during the civil war in the former Yugoslavia. Petric spent most of his youth in Switzerland after his family moved to the country in the early 1990s.
As a youngster, he played for his local side FC Neuenhof between 1986-1986 and moved to FC Baden in 1996. In 1998, he began his professional career at the same club and after one season, took a step up and signed for Grasshoppers Zürich. He spent five seasons at the Zürich club making 110 league appearances, scoring 30 league goals. In 2004, Swiss rivals FC Basel splashed out €3million for his services and he scored 39 goals in 72 appearances.
Petric’s final season in Switzerland ended with him finishing as top scorer with 19 goals which alerted Europe’s bigger clubs and he was signed by German club Borussia Dortmund for €3.5million in June 2007. His first season in the Bundesliga was productive and he finished joint 6th in the goalscoring charts with 13 goals in 29 appearances.
Petric’s international career began in 2001 when he made his debut for Croatia against South Korea in a friendly. The following year, he was overlooked for the 2002 World Cup squad but scored his first international goal for Croatia in a friendly against Wales in a 1-1 draw after the finals. He disappeared off the international radar for several years missing out on the 2006 World Cup in Germany but was recalled to the Croatian side after the finals by new coach Slaven Bilic, who introduced him as a second half substitute in a friendly against Italy in August 2006.
Bilic has publicised the fact that he is a big fan of Petric and he was a virtual ever-present for the ex-West Ham defender during the Euro 2008 qualifying campaign, scoring 7 goals including a 4-goal haul against Andorra in their 7-0 victory in Zagreb. Remarkably, Petric was honoured as the first ever Croatian to score 4 goals in a competitive match.
For a man of 27, Petric has only featured 24 times for his country, scoring 9 goals. Given the strength and depth of the Croatian squad, he has had to wait in the wings and persevere. Surprisingly, although he is well regarded by Bilic, prior to the England game, Petric was fourth in the pecking order behind Arsenal’s Eduardo, Hamburg SV’s Ivica Olic and Werder Bremen’s Ivan Klasnic. With Eduardo absent from the Euro 2008 squad through injury, Petric may get the nod to spearhead the attack in Croatia’s first Euro 2008 game against co-hosts Austria after his instrumental performance at Wembley.
Petric is a match winner who is capable of scoring fantastic goals in big games and there are a number of omens for him in Euro 2008. Firstly, Croatia play Germany, the country where he plies his trade, in their second group match. If they qualify as winners or runners up in the group, they will play their semi-final tie in Basel, and it was from Basel where Borussia Dortmund signed him. Petric was raised in Switzerland and should Croatia reach the semi-finals, I expect him to feel at home in Basel especially front of goal. I can see this year as the year that Mladen Petric comes of age.
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