Roko Šimić (born 10 September 2003) 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 lea ...

who plays as a forward for club

Cardiff City Cardiff City Football Club () is a professional association football club based in Cardiff, Wales. It currently competes in , the third tier of the English football league system in the 2025–26 season following relegation. Founded in 1899 a ...

Career

Lokomotiva Zagreb

Šimić made his senior debut for

Lokomotiva Zagreb Nogometni klub Lokomotiva Zagreb (), commonly known as Lokomotiva Zagreb or simply Lokomotiva, is a Croatian professional football club based in Zagreb. It competes in the Croatian First Football League, the country's top division. Founded in 1 ...

on 16 August 2020 in a 6–0

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 * ''League of Legends'', a 2009 multiplayer online battle a ...

defeat to

Dinamo Zagreb Građanski nogometni klub Dinamo Zagreb (), commonly referred to as simply Dinamo Zagreb (), is a Croatian professional football club based in Zagreb. Dinamo play their home matches at Stadion Maksimir. They are the most successful club in Cr ...

, getting substituted on for Indrit Tuci in the 66th minute. He was given an opportunity by coach

Goran Tomić Goran Tomić (; born 18 March 1977) is a Croatian professional Association football, football Manager (association football), manager and former Football player, player who is currently the manager of Croatian Football League, HNL club NK Istra ...

due to the club's lack of squad depth. During the

season A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's axial tilt, tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperat ...

, which was marked by Lokomotiva's struggle to preserve the first league status, Šimić made 26 appearances and scored four goals. He scored his debut goal for Lokomotiva on 7 October 2020, in a 3–2 victory over Gaj Mače in the

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 The Croatian Water Polo C ...

. His debut league goals came on 21 April 2021 when he scored a brace in the 4–0 victory over

Varaždin Varaždin ( or ; , also known by #Name, alternative names) is a city in Northern Croatia, north-east of Zagreb. The total population is 46,946, with 38,839 in the city settlement itself (2011). The city is best known for its baroque buildings, ...

Red Bull Salzburg

The first rumours that Red Bull Salzburg was following Šimić appeared in April 2021 in ''

Kleine Zeitung ''Kleine Zeitung'' (; ) is an Austrian newspaper based in Graz and Klagenfurt. As the largest regional newspaper in Austria, covering the federal states Styria and Carinthia with East Tyrol, the paper has around 800,000 readers. History and pro ...

''. Šimić signed a three-year deal with the Austrian club on 18 July 2021. With income of

€ The euro sign () is the currency sign used for the euro, the official currency of the eurozone. The design was presented to the public by the European Commission on 12 December 1996. It consists of a stylized letter E (or epsilon), crossed by t ...

4 million, it is Lokomotiva's most expensive transfer surpassing that of Ivo Grbić to

Atlético Madrid Club Atlético de Madrid, S.A.D. (; meaning "Athletic Club of Madrid"), commonly referred to as Atlético Madrid or simply Atlético, is a Spanish professional football club based in Madrid that plays in La Liga. The club play their home game ...

. Despite the initial plan to leave the player at Lokomotiva on loan for half a

, he moved to Austria immediately and joined Salzburg's

feeder club In sports, a farm team (also referred to as farm system, developmental system, feeder team, or nursery club) is generally a team or club whose role is to provide experience and training for young players, with an agreement that any successful pl ...

FC Liefering FC Liefering GmbH is an Football in Austria, Austrian association football club, originally from Salzburg#Districts, Liefering, Salzburg. It currently plays in the Austrian Football Second League, Second League, the second tier of Austrian f ...

. He made his debut for Liefering on 30 July 2021, getting substituted on for Dijon Kameri in the 46th minute, and scored his debut goal within a minute in a 2–1 victory over St. Pölten. On 10 October, he extended his contract with Salzburg until 2025, after impressing the club executives by scoring six goals in nine

appearances and two goals in two Youth League appearances. On 20 October 2021, he made his senior team and Champions League debut, replacing Noah Okafor in the 87th minute of the 3–1 victory over

VfL Wolfsburg Verein für Leibesübungen Wolfsburg e. V., commonly known as VfL Wolfsburg (), is a German professional sports club based in Wolfsburg, Lower Saxony. The club grew out of a multi-sports club for Volkswagen workers in the city of Wolfsburg. I ...

. Four days later, he made his

debut for the senior team, replacing Karim Adeyemi in the 87th minute of the 4–1 victory over

Sturm Graz Sportklub Sturm Graz is an Austrian professional association football club, based in Graz, playing in the Austrian Football Bundesliga. The club was founded in 1909. Its colours are black and white. In its history, Sturm Graz has won the Austr ...

. During Salzburg's path to the Youth League Final, Šimić contributed seven goals and three assists, making him the joint-top goalscorer of the competition together with Mads Hansen and Aral Şimşir. On 5 January 2023, Šimić joined reigning

Swiss Super League The Super League (also known as the Credit Suisse Super League for sponsorship reasons) is a professional association football league in Switzerland and the highest level of the Swiss football league system. It has been played in its current fo ...

champions

Zürich Zurich (; ) is the list of cities in Switzerland, largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is in north-central Switzerland, at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich. , the municipality had 448,664 inhabitants. The ...

on loan until the end of the 2022–23 season. He scored two goals on his debut on 21 January 2023 against

FC Luzern Fussball-Club Luzern (), or simply abbreviated to FCL, is a Swiss sports club based in Lucerne (). It is best known for its professional association football, football team, which plays in the Swiss Super League, Super League, the top tier of the ...

, after entering the game only in the 77th minute. On 20 September 2023, he scored his first Champions League goal by netting a penalty in a 2–0 away win over Benfica.

Cardiff City

On 30 August 2024, Šimić signed a four-year contract with

. Two days later, he was loaned to

Kortrijk Kortrijk ( , ; or ''Kortrik''; ), sometimes known in English as Courtrai or Courtray ( ), is a Belgian City status in Belgium, city and Municipalities in Belgium, municipality in the Flemish Region, Flemish Provinces of Belgium, province of We ...

in Belgium for one season. The loan was terminated on 6 January 2025.

Personal life

He is the son of former footballer

Dario Šimić Dario Šimić (; born 12 November 1975) is a Croatian former footballer. Šimić was a versatile defender who played as full-back, sweeper or centre back; a physical and hard-tackling defender, he was known in particular for his strength and ...

and his wife Jelena Medić, and was born in

Milan Milan ( , , ; ) is a city in northern Italy, regional capital of Lombardy, the largest city in Italy by urban area and the List of cities in Italy, second-most-populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of nea ...

during his father's stint with

AC Milan (), commonly referred to as Milan or AC Milan () mainly outside of Italy, is an Italian professional Football club (association football), football club based in Milan, Lombardy. Founded in 1899, the club competes in the Serie A, the top tie ...

. He has three brothers – Viktor, Nikolas and David. He is also a nephew of Josip Šimić. Roko Šimić is also

confirmation In Christian denominations that practice infant baptism, confirmation is seen as the sealing of the covenant (religion), covenant created in baptism. Those being confirmed are known as confirmands. The ceremony typically involves laying on o ...

sponsor of Lukas Kačavenda, and a distant relative of Herzegovinian

hajduk A hajduk (, plural of ) is a type of Irregular military, irregular infantry found in Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern, and parts of Southeast Europe from the late 16th to mid 19th centuries, especially from Hajdú–Bihar Count ...

Andrijica Šimić Andrija "Andrijica" Šimić (1833 – 5 February 1905) was a Herzegovinian hajduk. Biography Andrija Šimić (Andrijica is a diminutive form) was born in Grude, into an ethnic Croat family of seven children: he had a brother and five sisters. A ...

Career statistics

Club

;Notes

Honours

Red Bull Salzburg *

Austrian Bundesliga The Bundesliga ( , "Federal League"), also known as Admiral Bundesliga for sponsorship reasons, is a professional association football league in Austria and the highest level of the Austrian football league system. The competition decides the A ...

: 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 ...

Individual *

UEFA Youth League The UEFA Youth League is an annual club football competition organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) since 2013. In its current format, it is contested by the under-19 teams of the clubs competing in the UEFA Champions Le ...

top scorer: 2021–22

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Simic, Roko 2003 births Living people Footballers from Milan Croatian men's footballers Croatia men's under-21 international footballers Croatia men's youth international footballers Italian men's footballers Italian people of Croatian descent Italian people of Bosnia and Herzegovina descent Men's association football forwards NK Lokomotiva Zagreb players FC Red Bull Salzburg players FC Liefering players FC Zürich players Cardiff City F.C. players K.V. Kortrijk players Croatian Football League players 2. Liga (Austria) players Austrian Football Bundesliga players Swiss Super League players Belgian Pro League players Croatian expatriate men's footballers Croatian expatriate sportspeople in Austria Expatriate men's footballers in Austria Croatian expatriate sportspeople in Switzerland Expatriate men's footballers in Switzerland Croatian expatriate sportspeople in Wales Expatriate men's footballers in Wales Croatian expatriate sportspeople in Belgium Expatriate men's footballers in Belgium 21st-century Italian sportsmen