Hrvoje Babec (born 28 July 1999) is a Croatian professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby le ...

who plays as a midfielder for

Riga Riga (; lv, Rīga , liv, Rīgõ) is the capital and largest city of Latvia and is home to 605,802 inhabitants which is a third of Latvia's population. The city lies on the Gulf of Riga at the mouth of the Daugava river where it meets the Ba ...

in the Latvian Higher League.

Career

Early career

Born in

Virovitica Virovitica () is a Croatian city near the Hungarian border. It is situated near the Drava river and belongs to the historic region of Slavonia. Virovitica has a population of 14,688, with 21,291 people in the municipality (census 2011). It is als ...

, Babec grew up in the nearby village of Brezik, traveling to train with

. He was noted early by scouts from bigger clubs and moved to NK Osijek. At the start of 2012 Babec then moved to the Hypo-Limač football academy, run by former Croatia internationals

Petar Krpan Petar Krpan (born 1 July 1974) is a Croatian retired footballer who played as a forward. Club career Born in Osijek, Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, Krpan started his career with local club NK Osijek. Due to the war breaking out in ...

and

Matko Babić Matko Babić (born 28 July 1998) is a Croatian professional association football, footballer who plays as a forward (association football), forward for Liga I club FC Hermannstadt. Honours NK Rudeš *Croatian Second Football League, 2. HNL: 2016 ...

. After winning the national amateur club U-17 championship with the team, still 15 years old, he was scouted by foreign scouts and went to train with the Belgian RFC Seraing, and, since he couldn't be signed by them, moved forward after half a year later to France, to join the academy of RFC Seraing's partner club, FC Metz. In Metz, Babec would go on to become the captain of the FC Metz U-19 team, getting his first taste of senior football, playing for Metz II. In 2018, following managerial advice, Babec left France, and went on trial with Dinamo Zagreb B, but the transfer fell through.S 18 je bio kapetan u ligi petice, trebao je biti novi Modrić, bio na korak od Dinama, a onda je donio odluku zbog koje žali svaki dan!
at 100posto.hr In September 2018, then, looking for minutes, Babec moved to the Croatian third-tier club Vihor Jelisavac for one season.

HNK Gorica

On 14 July 2019, he signed with Gorica. Babec made his professional debut with Gorica in a 1–1

Croatian First Football League The Hrvatska nogometna liga () ( en, Croatian football league), also known as HNL or for sponsorship reasons the SuperSport HNL, is the top Croatian professional football (soccer), football league competition, established in 1992. Previously, i ...

win over NK Inter Zaprešić on 20 July 2019.

International career

Babec was born in Croatia, and was called up to represent the Croatia U21 at the

2021 UEFA European Under-21 Championship The 2021 UEFA European Under-21 Championship (also known as UEFA Under-21 Euro 2021) was the 23rd edition of the UEFA European Under-21 Championship (26th edition if the Under-23 era is also included), the biennial international youth football ch ...

References

External links

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Hrvoje Babec
at the official

Croatian Football Federation The Croatian Football Federation ( hr, Hrvatski nogometni savez, HNS) is the governing body of association football in Croatia. It was originally formed in 1912 and is based in the capital city of Zagreb. The organisation is a member of both FIF ...

Semafor site {{DEFAULTSORT:Babec, Hrvoje 1999 births Living people Sportspeople from Virovitica Croatian men's footballers Croatia men's youth international footballers Men's association football midfielders HNK Gorica players FC Metz players Croatian Football League players Championnat National 2 players Croatian expatriate men's footballers Croatian expatriate sportspeople in France Expatriate men's footballers in France Croatia men's under-21 international footballers