Osijek Explodes: Omerović Scores Half the Goals
Nail Omerović leads the scoring charts with four goals in two matches, and Osijek has already scored nearly a third of last season's total after just 180 minutes.
Nail Omerović leads the scoring charts with four goals in two matches, and Osijek has already scored nearly a third of last season's total after just 180 minutes.
After 180 minutes of league play, Osijek sits atop the SuperSport HNL standings and leads the league in goals scored. Last season, the Blue-Whites had the least potent attack in the league, with just 27 goals-ten fewer than Vukovar 1991, who were relegated. They were also the only team with an average of less than one goal per game.
In the season opener against Gorica, and then last weekend against Rudeš, Osijek found the back of the net eight times in total. In just two matches, they've already scored nearly a third of the goals they managed in all of last season, which spanned 36 games. Recall that last year, they didn't score their first goal until the fifth round, after exactly 392 league minutes without a goal, and they didn't reach their eighth goal until the 9th round-a quarter of the way through the season. They also didn't secure their second league win, which they now have after two rounds, until the eighth round last year.
The biggest reason for optimism is the form of Nail Omerović (23). The potential Bosnia and Herzegovina international has scored exactly half of Osijek's goals, and with four strikes, he leads the league's scoring charts. One goal against Gorica in the first round was denied by the woodwork. He has already equaled his tally from the 2024/25 season, during which he mostly played as a right-back before being moved closer to the opponent's goal towards the end. He is well on his way to surpassing his goal-scoring record from last season, when he was the Blue-Whites' top scorer with nine league goals. Last year, he scored as many goals as the next three Osijek league scorers combined: Jakupović, Jelenić, and Akere.
The sample size is still small, but the occasional BiH international's average of a goal every 44 minutes played, with a conversion rate of 30 percent, is quite impressive so far.
Now that things have "opened up" for them-unlike at the start of last season when they couldn't convert countless chances-it's much easier to play. "Last season, there were games where we had a 'million' chances, and the ball just wouldn't go in. Now we're getting rewarded for what we do on the pitch. Once you start taking chances, confidence grows. Then one goal leads to another. It's a good feeling," Omerović commented after scoring three times against Rudeš, which was his second hat-trick for Osijek.
With that, he joined the select group of players who have scored more than one hat-trick in a league match for the Blue-Whites. Since the start of the HNL, only a few Osijek players had scored two league hat-tricks before Omerović: Robert Špehar, Igor Pamić, Goran Ljubojević, and Mijo Caktaš. Ramon Mierez also scored two hat-tricks for the Blue-Whites, but one in the league and one in Europe.
There's no reason for euphoria at and around Opus Arena, as it's still early in the season, but the points tally and attacking play after last season's struggles with points, finishing, and later form, give reason for optimism.
