A moment with…Ivan Cupic

I’ve always liked Ivan Cupic. He has a ready smile, a mischievous nature and a great sense of humour. It hides, though, a deeper, thoughtful professional; a man who is always striving for success, a man who is a winner. This interview is one of the most vivid I have done, hard-hitting and heart-warming in equal measure. He waits for me after training, a tough training with Talant and says he has 10 minutes. He stays for 40.

“Talant is big in the whole world”

Although grateful that Bogdan Wenta brought him to Kielce, he admits that as a professional, you have to be prepared for changes. People are now looking in the direction of Kielce to see what might occur.

“I didn’t know bad Ivan Cupic”

The new era at Kielce has led to a greater focus for him. He admits he has lost weight and also freely admits that he hasn’t played well in the last four months. He can’t explain why, but he knows it’s not good enough. “I love to eat,” he says, maybe referring to the fact that he had put on some weight at the end of last year. He knows that he was brought to Kielce to win things and it didn’t sit happily with him that he was playing so badly. He is acutely aware that people pay him good money, that fans pay their hard earned cash to watch him play well. He is back to his best, having lost 2kg and he is enjoying the early months under the new coach.

“I’m tiny in this sport”

I was amazed at the depth of the interview, the range of topics and how deeply he thinks about things. Off the court, he says, he is just a normal guy, but he is a completely different animal on it. From his humble beginnings as a 12-year-old, when he was told he would be good, and had a future in the game, he realised he had to be fast and use his head. It is the Balkan mentality, first your head and you heart, then tactics. As if to lighten the mood he says he would be a giant in football, Luka Modric only comes up to his shoulder.

“When we play for Croatia, there is no club, no money; Croatia is Croatia”

He is so proud to play for his country and has a hunger to achieve more. He has silver and bronze medals, but it is not enough for him. He has great motivation to push on and win more. He knows when games are winnable, but even then he approaches them with another motivation in mind; to play well, to stop his opposite number, to get more assists. It is a side of him that I never knew. He feels the hurt of the loss in Denmark, knowing that he missed three shots in five minutes, which the “good” Ivan would have scored. He doesn’t even mention the rest of his teammates. He looks at his game and what he could have done better.

“Ten guys with torches, looking for a finger, for one hour”

And yet, six years ago, it could all have been so different. A slip, after training, led to him grabbing hold of a fence and losing his ring finger on his shooting hand. He laughs about it now, but says it took about 30 seconds before he knew anything was wrong. He missed the Beijing Olympics that year and his career was in jeopardy.

“If you want something badly enough, you will get it”

His contract signed, pre-injury, for Gorenje Velenje, led to the club and “people” wondering if he could ever play again. He heard grumbles of discontent, he heard the comments: “Cupic will never be the same again. He remembers his first game for GV and asking God if he could just let him have a great game to silence the doubters. He scored eight goals in 20 minutes. The path was clear. Cupic was back. “Now I’m just Ivan Cupic again”, he says, “not the guy with no finger”. He said that all the negative things made him strong, he needed revenge. He also helped his, at the time, RNL teammate Bielecki to overcome his loss of an eye. Strangely enough, both occurred during or after Croatia vs Poland games. He doesn’t make it sound like he counselled him through the whole process, just that he said “You are coming back, 1000%” He saw himself in Karol and knew that it could happen. 10 goals in his first game back against Goppingen just proved the point.

“Big league, good players”

His two years in the Bundesliga with Rhein Neckar Löwen were good years and a good experience, but he is damning of the league as a whole. He talks of “Bundesliga Burnout” and how a small player like him, needs to be fast to survive in a big man’s game. But in the end, the boy from Croatia needs the team ethic. He needs the feeling that he is there building something for a future. He and Talant may have found a home together, both have the same philosophy. He admires greatly the work of Kielce and the perspective they have on how something should be built. It is a step by step project and Cupic is completely immersed in it. He wants to win the VELUX EHF Champions League for Kielce because, not only, as he freely admits has he won nothing yet, but also, and this shows the depth of the man, he knows the club and Poland need something like that.

I always liked Ivan and now I like him even more. He is a winner, a competitor, a team man and a leader. I joke with him that he may have a “Napoleonic complex”. He disagrees. “Why bother to do it if I can’t win,” he replies. You can’t argue with that.

If you have 40 minutes of time, listen to him. He is hilarious as he advises wingers on how to beat a keeper, he jokes about what the future may have held for himself and Bielecki. He is thoughtful, smart and articulate on many subjects. For fans of Kielce, he is the man you want in your corner.

Listen to the full interview with Ivan here.