The italian version of this exclusive interview by our english friend Nigel will be published in the next few hours

La versione italiana di questa intervista esclusiva ad opera del nostro amico collaboratore inglese Nigel verra’ pubblicata nelle prossime ore

Ahead of our historic Champions League debut the Atalantini team have decided to interview a fan of each of our Champions League Opponents. We debut in the Champions League on Wednesday against Dinamo in Zagreb so I spoke to Dinamo fan Ivan Ribic ahead of the game to find out a bit about Dinamo and to find out what Dinamo fans know about us

Who are Dinamo?

Dinamo Zagreb is the most succesful Croatian football club. They are based in Zagreb, the capital of Croatia. Dinamo have won 20 titles in Croatian first league since the independency, 15 titles in Croatian Cup and 6 titles in Croatian Super Cup. They’ve been constant participants in UEFA competitions for years now, but finally had some remarkable result last year, when they managed to get past group of a UEFA competition after 49 years.

Why do you support Dinamo?

I support Dinamo because of “local patriotism”, I was born in Zagreb, the first game I ever watched was Dinamo’s game, and the first time I had watched the game live was on Maksimir, the stadium of Dinamo Zagreb.
They also have passionate fans which call themselves “Bad Blue Boys” and the can create a great atmosphere. However, they had issues with club’s boss and they were boycotting games in the past.

How are your favourite Dinamo players Past/Present?

My favorite player in history of the club is Luka Modrić, who is probably one of the best, if not the best, to ever play for the club. He established himself in the Zagreb and later moved to Tottenham, and in the end, became footballer of the year in 2018, which was obviously pinnacle of his great career. Today, the most talented and exciting player to watch is Dani Olmo. He was brought from Barcelona’s famous academy “La Masia”when he was as a captain of their team U16 team. He was champion with Spain at the recent UEFA U-21 European Champiionship and he was MVP of the FInal against France.

What are your expectations for Dinamo in Europe this season?

My expectations and expectations of the majority of fans are to reach Europa League’s knockout stage, Round of 32. 3rd place in the group would be required, but group with City, Atalanta and Shakhtar isn’t the easiest and fans are aware of that, so I think that even 4th place with some good performances wouldn’t be too much of a disappointment. However, Dinamo’s manager Nenad Bjelica is very confident and he said that his squad will play very aggressive football and try to go for a win in every game.

What do you know about Atalanta?

Atalanta is my favourite foreign club since the arrival of Alejandro Papu Gomez five years ago as he was one of my favourite and most exciting players to watch in his Catania and Kharkiv games. I know that they have won Coppa Italia in 1963 and had multiple finals including last year against Lazio, which they lost, unfortunately. Since Gasperini’s arrival in 2016., they started playing nice, eye-candy attacking football with one of the most potent and talented attack in Italy. They managed to finish 3rd in Serie A last season and this will be their first appearance in Champions League.

Any Atalanta players you like watching?

There are many fantastic players in Atalanta, but my favourites are Papu, Iličić and De Roon. Papu is very smart player and engine of the team. He likes to drop back in order to help with the build-up and send some vertical passes to the last third of the pitch, mostly looking for Zapata and Iličić. Josip Iličić is one of the most underrated players in the world, with great technique, pass and dribbling, he has a very high understanding of the game and positioning, he likes to lurk around the half-space looking for a ball. Josip is a gamechanger type of player. Maarten de Roon is very “smooth” player, great ball passer and seems to always find best solution on the pitch. He was also a vital part of Netherlands national team in UEFA Nations League and European qualifiers.

What do you think the score will be on Wednesday?

It’s always hard to predict the score, but I can assure you that it could potentially be a difficult game for Atalanta, especially if they underestimate Dinamo. They are especially good at their home pitch in Maksimir, they’ve beaten Benfica last season. Dinamo is very patient type of team, against stronger teams they like to sit in defensive 4-1-4-1 block sometimes changing to 4-4-2. They are very dangerous in counter-attacks with some great offensive players, and the biggest danger comes from Bruno Petković and Dani Olmo. I expect Atalanta to dominate the possession most of the time, but they have to be aware of possible counter attacks. Dinamo also has decent set-pieces which could be a potential problem. Nevertheless. I expect Atalanta to win with 0-2.

Huge thanks to Ivan for answering our questions and we hope you enjoy the game Wednesday. You can follow Ivan on Twitter @TheRibic