Darío Cvitanich

As of 24 October 2011

Cvitanich was born in Argentina with distant Croatian heritage. He established himself as a quality footballer in his home country playing for Banfield in the Argentine Primera División. After much consideration he eventually pledged to play for the Croatia national team, stating that "such an opportunity only comes once and you must take it." It became known on 14 January 2009 that he could not play for Croatia, because the FIFA rules do not allow nationality to be taken from great-grandparents.

FIFA opposes the 24-year-old Ajax Amsterdam player wearing the "checkered" shirt, considering his Croatian origins too distant, HNS-CFF Secretary General Zorislav Srebric said. "FIFA requires that at least one of the grandparents must have been born in a country to grant a football citizenship," said the HNS-CFF representative. "We will continue to try to persuade FIFA to make an exception, although we are not very hopeful," Srebric said.

In the case of the striker, only one of his great-grandparents was being born at the Croatian territories and later emigrated to Argentina. Neither that nor his typical surname from Croatia will be able to help him against FIFA. Cvitanich obtained the Croatian passport back in 2008, but that's not a sufficient argument for the FIFA.

Banfield

Cvitanich started his career in Club Atlético Banfield's youth and made his debut for the club's first team at the age of 19 on 20 October 2003 in a 3–1 defeat to Olimpo de Bahía Blanca. He scored a hat-trick in a 4–0 win against Newell's Old Boys on 27 April 2007. He played, and scored, for Banfield in the Copa Libertadores 2007. He also served as a loyal member of Banfield during his early youth years in Argentina. Just prior to leaving his childhood side, he excelled his final loyalty by scoring 13 times during Banfield's run at the Clausura 2008 tournament.

Ajax

Cvitanich signed for Ajax, although he did not leave Banfield until the end of the 2008 season. He was labelled the successor to Klaas-Jan Huntelaar and scored his first goal against NAC Breda on 12 December 2008. Following the match against NAC, Cvitanich scored his first brace and his first hat-trick in subsequent weeks against De Graafschap and ADO Den Haag. He scored his first hat-trick of the 2009–10 season against NAC Breda.

Loan to Pachuca

Cvitanich joined Mexican side Pachuca on a year's loan on 1 January 2010. He helped the Mexican side to win their fourth CONCACAF Champions League title, and returned to Ajax on 3 November 2010, helping the club win their 30th Dutch league title.

Loan to Boca Juniors

Cvitanich signed with Boca Juniors in July 2011, on a one-year loan deal. He scored his first goal for Boca on 28 August 2011, against San Lorenzo de…

Cvitanich obtained a Croatian passport in August 2008. He has dual citizenship, holding both Argentine and Croatian passports. The surname Cvitanić has his origin on the island of Brač. During the last century, every tenth citizen of the island was one of the family of the Cvitanić's.