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The Croatian football public was surprised after learning that the legendary Croatian goalkeeper Tonči Gabrić died suddenly at the age of 64.
We are talking about a goalkeeper who left a big mark on Croatian football, which is confirmed by the years of his career during which, among others, he was the goalkeeper of the Croatian national team.
Gabrić started playing football in NK Orkan from Dugi Rat before, as a promising and talented goalkeeper, he moved to the younger selections of NK Hajduk from Split.
In the 1981/82 season. he was at the door of the then second division club NK Solin, from where he moved to RNK Split, for which he played until 1984. While playing for Split, Gabrić scored eight goals, taking penalty kicks. In doing so, he always shot to the goalkeeper’s left side.
He entered the first league senior stage in 1984 as the goalkeeper of NK Čelik from Zenica, whose goal he defended in 24 games. He then moved to NK Hajduk, but in his first stay at the Split club, he did not make a single appearance.
With the aim of defending and gaining the necessary experience, he moved to NK Rijeka, for which he played from 1988 to 1991. From Rijeka, he went abroad to the Greek PAOK, where he was the goalkeeper from 1991 to 1993. He also won the Greek Cup with this Greek club.
After Greece, there was an episode in NK Pazinka, from where he went to NK Hajduk, for which he played from 1994 to 1999. Ivan Katalinić, the “former” coach at the time, insisted the most on his return to Split.
The rest is recorded as it was with the Split club in the 1994/95 season. won the Croatian championship and the cup. He particularly stood out with his saves in the then Champions League when he was considered the club’s best individual. His defenses against Steaua in Romania and against Anderlecht in Split remained unforgettable, which led to his call-up to the Croatian national team.
Part of the national team
Gabrić is also the winner of Torcida’s “Heart of Hajduk” trophy as Hajduk’s most combative football player in the 1996/97 season. He played a total of 187 games for NK Hajduk. He ended his professional football career in Hajduk, where he was replaced by Stipe Pletikosa, after whom he dedicated himself to training the club’s goalkeeper. After finishing his professional career, he was for a time the goalkeeper of NK Junak from Sinj.
Tonči Gabrić was part of the Croatian national football team for seven years, for which he made only nine appearances, including his national team debut on October 17, 1990 in Zagreb, which was the historic first game of the Croatian national football team. The opponent was the USA.
The reason why he made only nine appearances during his national team career is the fact that Dražen Ladić was in goal for the national team. At the Euro 1996 in England, Gabrić was part of the “fire team”. During his entire football career, he was decorated with exceptional speed and goalkeeping reactions.
Those who know his football career better know that before the European Championship in England he had an excellent offer from Austria, but then Hajduk did not let him go. His friends say that Gabrić did not even insist so much on going abroad because, as he himself said, he was completely calm and content with living in his hometown, he was still the goalkeeper of Hajduk, which is a symbol of Split and Dalmatia. Gabrić ended his professional career at the age of 38.
The fans loved him
“Tonči Gabrić, a goalkeeper of great quality, was a frequent target of injustice during his football career, which, however, preceded new, happier chapters in his life. Despite the many injustices that followed him, in his late playing years he experienced the peak of his career and achieved in football what many can only dream of”, reads the announcement of NK Hajduk on the occasion of Gabrić’s death.
After the death of his friend, Gabrić’s former teammate Ivica Mornar recalled to the media how they played together in big European matches, celebrated championship titles… He also said that he did not know he was sick and that he never complained to anyone.
“We are bound by a billion anecdotes. Memories keep coming back to me. He was a top goalkeeper, a legend. There was no one who did not love him. There was no crying with him, always laughter. Tonci went to Torcida’s birthday. There is some symbolism there because the fans have always loved him,” Mornar said.
Departure from Greece
A year ago, on the eve of the match between Hajduk and Greek PAOK for the Conference League, Gabrić gave his last interview to a Croatian daily 24 hours. He recalled then how the fans adored him in Thessaloniki, but also that he left the club due to an incident.
“The city is phenomenal, and the people are very kind. It was phenomenal for me down there, I couldn’t walk around the city with my wife and children without someone stopping us, asking for an autograph… But it was also wartime and the inconveniences started very quickly.
I lived in an elite part of Thessaloniki, I regularly parked my BMW with Split license plates in front of the house, which even then had the Croatian coat of arms… And one day, a poster of the Croatian national football team appeared on the car, from that first historic match against the USA. There was a hole in the place of my head, and below it was written: ‘Ustaša, this is how you will end up’.
I was not comfortable, primarily because of my family, so I left Thessaloniki very soon after that. In the building where we lived, there was a night club where the ‘Arkan people’ who came to Greece on vacation used to stop by for ‘bouzouki’.
They probably wrote it… That’s why I paid extra for the night guards who guarded the club to keep an eye on my car for a few hours after closing. And it was like that until I left,” Gabrić said in that interview.
Gabrić comes from a sports family, so it is known that his son Drago was a professional footballer who played for Hajduk, Rijeka and the Turkish Trabzonspor. Draga’s twin sister Paškvalina was one of the best soccer players in Croatia for a number of years.
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