It’s been another usually strong year for the Vukovi, and in many ways an exact duplicate of last year’s. Just one loss, to the same team, in the same city, and a late won first place that secured a home playoff game. Still, they did it with a much different team.
The offense went through a change and the offensive line along with it. Maybe it’s even where change was felt the most — they played with three new starters, but at times all three would be players in their first year as senior players.
“I’m proud at the people playing there — we went through big changes. At the moment we’re the youngest offensive line in the league, but I think we think we’re good enough to be able to run over people on the ground”, says Branko Mutić, who switched from guard to tackle this year to fill a hole left because of player departure.
At just 20 years of age, he is, now in his third year with the senior squad, paradoxically one of the team’s most experienced offensive lineman. The oldest isn’t that old either, at the age of 24, and most are hovering around Mutić’s age.
“It says everything about our youth and inexperience, however, I feel as though we’ve proven ourselves enough times this season that we’re not the weak link on the team, on the contrary.”
The big thing for this team has been the defense this year, but early on even the offense was rolling without a hitch. It came to a stop near the end of the spring season — everything was suddenly much harder for them, and the offense was no exception. In fact, it struggled the most, as they lost the championship game in Serbia, with the offense being the main reason the game seemed like a blowout for three quarters. Maybe it would’ve been different, had their left tackled not missed the game because of health problems.
“It was extremely hard, it would’ve been easier had I been with the team. Had I played, it would’ve been easier even with the loss. I think we’re a better team than what we showed that time, it just wasn’t the right moment for us. Comparing it to now, the team’s doing much better. Shape-wise, we’re on a higher level — I think we’ve reached the top of our form.”
The semifinal still didn’t go as smoothly as one might think, and now a much tougher opponent is before them. The good news is they never lost to the Gladiators, but since they haven’t played this year, it’s hard to say who’s where this season. The Gladiators also struggled to beat the Dukes, but they are unbeaten on the field this year, and though they usually don’t play in Vienna, it’s still home field advantage for them.
“The Gladiators are a good team, and that they struggled doesn’t mean anything”, says Mutić, but he couldn’t help remember how the previous two games went down. “In our two games up to this point, they’ve made more threats than play. We’re not that type of team, we play football and our results show it.”
Now, they have one more step to take, and to make this season exactly the same as the last one.