Dejan Lovren

Dinamo Zagreb

Lovren first played football in Germany with Munich-based BSC Sendling. After moving to Croatia, he played for local teams NK Ilovac and NK Karlovac as a youth before joining NK Dinamo Zagreb in 2004. On 10 May 2006, he made his debut for Dinamo in a Prva HNL match against NK Varteks. On 17 July 2006, Lovren was loaned to NK Inter Zaprešić for two seasons where he made 50 league appearances and scored one goal. Following his return from loan Lovren regularly featured in Dinamo's starting XI, appearing in 38 matches throughout the 2008–09 season and scoring three goals. In the 2009–10 season, he featured in all four of Dinamo's UEFA Champions League qualifiers against Pyunik Yerevan and Red Bull Salzburg, and managed to score a header against Pyunik.

Lyon

In January 2010, Lovren signed for French Ligue 1 club Olympique Lyonnais for €8 million plus €1.5 million in incentives on a four-and-a-half-year contract. He made his competitive debut on 24 January 2010 in their 2–1 defeat to AS Monaco in the Coupe de France, playing the full match. His Ligue 1 debut came on 31 January in Lyon's 2–1 win at home against Paris Saint-Germain, once again playing the full 90 minutes. During the second half of the season, he made 10 appearances, mostly as a substitute. He was not allowed to participate in Lyon's matches in the UEFA Champions League that season as he had already played in the competition for Dinamo Zagreb. Lovren's playing time increased during…

Lovren made 54 appearances and scored six goals for various Croatian youth national teams. He received his first call-up to Croatia national team in August 2009 by manager Slaven Bilić, who included the player in his match squad against Belarus. Lovren was an unused substitute, but still was reportedly delighted with the new experience. He made his debut against Qatar on 8 November 2009, coming on as a substitute for Danijel Pranjić. On 2 September 2011, Lovren scored his first international goal, against Malta in a UEFA Euro 2012 qualifying match. He was included by manager Slaven Bilić in the training camp prior to the UEFA Euro 2012 but was not selected for the final squad because of an injury. Lovren scored his second goal for Croatia on 26 March 2013 in a World Cup qualifying match against Wales at the Liberty Stadium in Swansea. It was an equalizer that leveled the match after Gareth Bale had given Wales the lead from a penalty which Lovren caused. Croatia eventually won the game 1–2. In May 2014, Lovren was named in manager Niko Kovač's provisional 30-man squad for the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil. In the opening match of the tournament, on 12 June against the hosts Brazil in São Paulo, Lovren was judged by the Japanese referee Yuichi Nishimura to have fouled Fred in the 69th minute when the score was 1–1. A controversial penalty was given, which was converted by Neymar and led to Brazil's eventual 3–1 win. He was featured in the other two group stage matches as…

Dejan Lovren was born on 5 July 1989 to Bosnian Croat parents Silva (née Trgovčević) and Saša Lovren in Zenica, SR Bosnia and Herzegovina and spent his first years of life in the nearby village of Kraljeva Sutjeska. The family was displaced from their home due to the Bosnian War when Lovren was three years old; they eventually settled in Munich. His family eventually had to leave as they did not possess necessary documentation to reside in Germany and settled in Karlovac, Croatia, 50 kilometres southwest of the capital city of Zagreb. Lovren stated that he initially found settling in Croatia difficult.

Lovren's younger brother Davor is also a professional footballer who currently is a free agent after playing for Kustošija. Lovren was named by his grandmother Ivanka after the Montenegrin football legend Dejan Savićević. He speaks Croatian, German, English and French. Lovren is married to Anita Sekulić and the couple have two children, Elena, born in August 2012, and Josip, born in June 2015. In 2013, Lovren founded a fashion brand Russell Brown with his best man Lovro Krčar. Three years after, the brand was shut down for unknown reasons. Rumours suggest that the reason for the closure was due to a poor relationship between Lovren and Krčar. In May 2018, he founded another brand Rock Filius. On 29 May 2018, Lovren opened a four star hotel Joel in Novalja, near Zrće. Lovren has stated that the hotel is named after Josip and Elena. On 29 December 2020, Lovren offered free temporary accommodation in the hotel for sixteen families who had lost their homes in the 2020 Petrinja earthquake. During 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil, paparazzi leaked explicit photos of several Croatian internationals taking a "skinny dip" in the pool of a Brazilian hotel. Lovren reportedly suffered the most since almost his entire body was exposed. He made a cameo appearance in Jakov Sedlar's 2021 film The Match, alongside Croatia teammate Mateo Kovačić.

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In February 2017, LFC TV released a short documentary Lovren: My Life as a Refugee where the footballer opened up about his…