Croatia round-up: Varteks secure draw

A late goal earned Prva HNL high fliers NK Varteks a 2-2 draw away at NK Slaven Belupo in Saturday’s round 18 game.

Drobne saves the day
Oskar Drobne’s added-time strike secured a share of the points for Varteks and left them level on points with league-leaders NK Zagreb on 39 points, though Zagreb have a game in hand. However, Varteks may see the result as a missed opportunity as a win would have seen them go two points clear of Zagreb.

Varteks under pressure
Slaven took the lead through Miljenko Kovacic after 16 minutes, but Sasa Bjelanovic’s came up with an equaliser for Slaven on 37 minutes. All seemed to be lost for Varteks when they failed to find an immediate response to Renato Jurcec’s 54th-minute strike, but Drobne was on hand to save them in injury time.

Cakovec hit three
In Saturday’s other game, NK Cakovec made light work of NK Zadarkomerc. Gregor Bunc gave them the lead after just two minutes but they had to wait until the second half for Velibor Vujic (67) and Zeljko Skopljanac (81) to complete the scoring.