Lovre Kalinić (; born 3 April 1990) 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 goalkeeper for

Hajduk Split Hrvatski nogometni klub Hajduk Split, commonly referred to as Hajduk Split () or simply Hajduk, is a Croatian professional football club based in Split, that competes in the Croatian First League, the top tier in Croatian football. Since 1979, t ...

Club career

Hajduk Split

Lovre Kalinić made his

HNK Hajduk Split Hrvatski nogometni klub Hajduk Split, commonly referred to as Hajduk Split () or simply Hajduk, is a Croatian professional football club based in Split, that competes in the Croatian First League, the top tier in Croatian football. Since 1979, t ...

debut on 23 April 2011, under manager Ante Miše at the age of 21 years and 20 days, in a

Prva HNL 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 league competition, established in 1992. Previously, it was called Prva H ...

match against

NK Slaven Belupo Nogometni klub Slaven Belupo ( en, Slaven Belupo Football Club), often referred to as NK Slaven Belupo, Slaven Belupo or simply Slaven, and known internationally as NK Slaven Koprivnica, is a Croatian professional football club based in the city ...

, which his side won 2–1. After loans to Junak Sinj in 2009,

Novalja Novalja () is a town in the north of the island of Pag in the Croatian part of Adriatic Sea. In recent times, Novalja has become famous because of the Zrće Beach. History The earliest settlers on the island were an Illyrian tribe that came to ...

in 2010 and

Karlovac Karlovac () is a city in central Croatia. According to the 2011 census, its population was 55,705. Karlovac is the administrative centre of Karlovac County. The city is located on the Zagreb- Rijeka highway and railway line, south-west of Zagre ...

in 2012, Hajduk manager Igor Tudor brought Lovre Kalinić back to

to be the number one goalkeeper for the 2013–14 season. In the 2015–16 season, Kalinić set a new record for most consecutive minutes without a goal conceded in the

1. HNL 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 league competition, established in 1992. Previously, it was called Prva H ...

. The goalkeeper went eight games, or 775 minutes, without conceding a goal. The previous record was held by

Zoran Slavica Zoran Slavica (born 28 March 1967) is a Croatian professional football manager and former player, who was most recently the manager of Treća HNL club NK Vodice. Club career During his professional career he played for Šibenik in his hometown a ...

, who went 711 minutes without conceding a goal in the Prva HNL. As a result of being part of Croatia's UEFA Euro 2016 squad, Kalinić missed the first three rounds of Hajduk's 2016–17 season, being granted an extended holiday by Hajduk boss Marijan Pušnik. He made his return on 28 July 2016, where Hajduk defeated FC Oleksandriya 3–0 in the Third Round of the

2016-17 UEFA Europa League 16-17 is a band from Basel, Switzerland. Their music combines punk rock, hardcore punk, jazz and industrial music. Biography 16-17 was founded in 1983 by Alex Buess, Knut Remond and Markus Kneubühler. When the group played its first con ...

qualifying at

CSC Nika Stadium Cultural Sports Complex Nika Stadium is a football stadium in the city of Oleksandria, Ukraine. The stadium was rebuilt in 1998 in place of Shakhtar Stadium under a new name Nika. The stadium is the home ground of Ukrainian Premier League club P ...

, keeping a clean sheet. In September 2016, Kalinić signed a new five-year contract with Hajduk. In his time at Hajduk, Kalinić made 134 official appearances across seven seasons. In total, Kalinić spent 17 years of junior and senior football with Hajduk.

Gent

On 27 December 2016, Hajduk announced that Lovre Kalinić had played his last game for the club, with a move to

Belgian First Division A The Belgian Pro League,(officially the Jupiler Pro League due to sponsorship reasons with Jupiler), is the top league competition for association football clubs in Belgium. Contested by 18 clubs since the 2020–21 season and reduced to 16 team ...

side

K.A.A. Gent Koninklijke Atletiek Associatie Gent (, English: ''Royal Athletic Association Ghent''), often simply known as Ghent or by their nickname ' ( en, The Buffalos), is a Belgian sports club, based in the city of Ghent, East Flanders. Their football ...

completed. The transfer fee is the highest fee for a goalkeeper in the history of the

. The €3.1m transfer fee will make Kalinić the most expensive player in Gent's history. He was named Best Goalkeeper in the Belgian league for the 2016–17 season, after having played only half a season upon arriving in January to Gent from Hajduk Split.

Aston Villa

On 21 December 2018, English Championship club

Aston Villa Aston Villa Football Club is a professional football club based in Aston, Birmingham, England. The club competes in the , the top tier of the English football league system. Founded in 1874, they have played at their home ground, Villa Park ...

announced that they had reached an agreement with Gent to sign Kalinić at the start of the January transfer window. Villa had already attempted to sign Kalinić in 2016 but were denied a work permit. He signed a contract to the end of the 2022–23 season. He officially joined on 1 January 2019 and made his debut four days later in a 3–0 defeat in a home FA Cup tie against

Swansea City Swansea City Association Football Club (; cy, Clwb Pêl-droed Cymdeithas Dinas Abertawe) is a professional football club based in Swansea, Wales that plays in the Championship, the second tier of English football. Swansea have played their ho ...

. His league debut came a week later in another 3–0 defeat, this time against

Wigan Athletic Wigan Athletic Football Club () is an English professional association football club based in Wigan, Greater Manchester, England. The team competes in the Championship, the second tier of the English football league system. Founded in 1932, ...

, which was followed by a 2–2 draw with Hull City – meaning that Kalinić had conceded 8 goals in his first 3 games. He played what would prove to be his last game for the club against West Bromwich Albion on 16 February 2019.

Toulouse (loan)

On 20 January 2020, Kalinić joined

Ligue 1 Ligue 1, officially known as Ligue 1 Uber Eats for sponsorship reasons, is a French professional league for men's association football clubs. At the top of the French football league system, it is the country's primary football competition. A ...

club Toulouse until the end of the 2019–20 season. However, he made only four appearances before the

league League or The League may refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''Leagues'' (band), an American rock band * ''The League'', an American sitcom broadcast on FX and FXX about fantasy football Sports * Sports league * Rugby league, full contact footba ...

was called off due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Hajduk Split (loan)

On 22 December 2020, after making no appearances for Villa in the 2020–21 season up to that point, it was announced that Kalinić would go out on loan to Hajduk Split, where he started his career. The loan was scheduled to commence on 18 January 2021 – when the Croatian transfer window opened. On 22 January, he made his second debut for Hajduk in a 1–0 league victory over Šibenik. On 11 July 2021, Aston Villa announced that Kalinić would rejoin Hajduk Split on loan for another season. Kalinić explained that Aston Villa had wanted to sell him to another club, but he was adamant that he wanted to return to Hajduk Split as he had been named club captain. Eventually, an agreement for a second season on loan was agreed by all parties.

Permanent return to Hajduk Split

On 1 July 2022, Kalinić signed for Hajduk Split once again, this time on a permanent transfer. The details were not announced by either club, but it was rumoured to have been a free transfer.

International career

After

Stipe Pletikosa Stipe Pletikosa (; born 8 January 1979) is a Croatian former professional footballer who played as a goalkeeper. As of 29 July 2021, he works at the Croatian Football Federation as the technical director of the national senior and under-21 tea ...

retired from international football in 2014, Kalinić became Croatia's second choice goalkeeper behind

Danijel Subašić Danijel Subašić (born 27 October 1984) is a Croatian professional footballer who plays as a goalkeeper for Hajduk Split. Subašić began his career in Croatia with Zadar and Hajduk. In January 2012, he joined Monaco, and went on to make 292 ...

. He made his debut for Croatia in a November 2014 friendly match against Argentina. He was part of Croatia's UEFA Euro 2016 squad. In May 2018 he was named in Croatia's 23-man squad for the

2018 FIFA World Cup The 2018 FIFA World Cup was the 21st FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial world championship for men's national Association football, football teams organized by FIFA. It took place in Russia from 14 June to 15 July 2018, after the country was awa ...

in Russia. He played the last match of group stage against Iceland making several crucial saves. Croatia finished as the runners-up of the tournament, losing to France in the final. After the tournament ended, Subašić retired from international football. Kalinić has thus been appointed as the first choice goalkeeper for the national team. However, due to injuries and the consequent drop in form, he was benched again in favour of

Dominik Livaković Dominik Livaković (; born 9 January 1995) is a Croatian professional footballer who plays as a goalkeeper for Süper Lig club Fenerbahçe and the Croatia national team. Club career NK Zagreb Livaković became part of NK Zagreb's first t ...

Career statistics

Club

International

Honours

Aston Villa *

EFL Championship play-offs The English Football League Championship play-offs are a series of play-off matches contested by the association football teams finishing from third to sixth in the EFL Championship table and are part of the English Football League play-offs. , t ...

2019 File:2019 collage v1.png, From top left, clockwise: Hong Kong protests turn to widespread riots and civil disobedience; House of Representatives votes to adopt articles of impeachment against Donald Trump; CRISPR gene editing first used to experim ...

Hajduk Split *

Croatian Cup Croatian Cup may refer to: *Croatian Football Cup *Croatian Football Super Cup * Croatian Women's Football Cup *Croatian Basketball Cup, also known as Krešimir Ćosić Cup *Croatian Handball Cup *Croatian Water Polo Cup *Croatian Minute Movie Cup ...

2012–13 1 (one, unit, unity) is a number representing a single or the only entity. 1 is also a numerical digit and represents a single unit of counting or measurement. For example, a line segment of ''unit length'' is a line segment of length 1. I ...

, 2021–22,

2022–23 The dash is a punctuation mark consisting of a long horizontal line. It is similar in appearance to the hyphen but is longer and sometimes higher from the baseline. The most common versions are the endash , generally longer than the hyphen b ...

Croatia * FIFA World Cup runner-up:

2018 File:2018 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2018 Winter Olympics opening ceremony in PyeongChang, South Korea; Protests erupt following the Assassination of Jamal Khashoggi; March for Our Lives protests take place across the United ...

Individual *

Football Oscar The Football Oscar ( hr, Nogometni Oscar) is an annual football award given by the Croatian Association Football Union and Sportske novosti since 2013. In the 2017 edition the award was renamed as Trophy Footballer ( hr, Trofej Nogometaš). It is aw ...

Best Goalkeeper in

: 2015, 2016 * Best AA Gent-Player of the Season: 2016-17 * Belgian Professional Goalkeeper of the Season: 2016–17 * Belgian Goalkeeper of the Year:

2017 File:2017 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: The War Against ISIS at the Battle of Mosul (2016-2017); aftermath of the Manchester Arena bombing; The Solar eclipse of August 21, 2017 ("Great American Eclipse"); North Korea tests a ser ...

Orders * Order of Duke Branimir: 2018

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Kalinic, Lovre 1990 births Living people Footballers from Split, Croatia Men's association football goalkeepers Croatian men's footballers Croatia men's youth international footballers Croatia men's under-21 international footballers Croatia men's international footballers UEFA Euro 2016 players 2018 FIFA World Cup players UEFA Euro 2020 players HNK Hajduk Split players NK Junak Sinj players NK Novalja players NK Karlovac 1919 players K.A.A. Gent players Aston Villa F.C. players Toulouse FC players Croatian Football League players Belgian Pro League players English Football League players Ligue 1 players Croatian expatriate men's footballers Expatriate men's footballers in Belgium Croatian expatriate sportspeople in Belgium Expatriate men's footballers in England Croatian expatriate sportspeople in England Expatriate men's footballers in France Croatian expatriate sportspeople in France