The older the year, the more spectacular the goals. After Luis Diaz’s “amazing goal” in November, Luka Vuskovic followed up in December. The 18-year-old Croatian scored an absolute dream goal with a backheel in the Bundesliga game against Werder Bremen and was voted goal scorer of the month with 26 percent of all votes. Lucas Höler from SC Freiburg came in second (approx. 25 percent). Martin Terrier from Bayer Leverkusen came third (23 percent).
In view of this exceptional goal, the question arises: Is the man really a defender? Or maybe it’s more of a disguised striker and no one has noticed it yet? But Vuskovic is actually one of the best defensive talents in Europe and in this class it’s perhaps par for the course to be able to score goals like that.
Highlight of the hard-fought northern derby
The northern derby on this 13th matchday of the 25/26 Bundesliga season is definitely not for the faint of heart. The memorable game in Hamburg swings back and forth. Sometimes Werder is ahead, then again HSV. The absolute highlight in this game, which is so full of highlights, occurs in the 75th minute of the game.
Free kick for HSV from the right side. Fabio Vieira plays him high in Bremen’s 16s. At about the penalty spot, the ball sinks into Vuskovic’s back. “I was a bit lucky”commented on his goal after the game. “I couldn’t have done anything else but that.” So the young Croatian chooses the volley-heel variant, takes the ball straight out of the air and kicks it with his back foot past the surprised Werder goalkeeper Mio Backhaus and into the goal net.
A real goal twin
The goal is a bit similar to the rare Scorpion kick goals in Goal of the Month, but lacks a level of difficulty that Valentino Lazaro showed in November 2020 and Alu Kuol in June 2022 and, incidentally, also the third-place finisher at TdM December 2025, Martin Terrier.
Vuskovic’s goal is still an absolute feast for the eyes and a real goal twin of a goal of the month from August 2017, scored by Nico Perrey. Here, too, the ball came from the right wing and Perrey stood at the penalty spot and kicked the ball into the goal just as casually and elegantly as Vuskovic did eight years later. And there is another parallel: Perrey was also a defender.
The Vuskovics football dynasty
Luka Vuskovic was literally born with talent. He grew up in the Croatian city of Split and is part of a real football dynasty there. Great-grandfather, grandfather, father, brother Mario and himself all played for the Hajduk Split club.
The young central defender came to Hamburg on loan from Tottenham in the summer of 2025 and immediately impressed the Hamburg fans with impressive tackle numbers and an astonishing calmness for his age. He quickly rose in the hierarchy of HSV, which was newly formed in the promotion season, to become head of defense. Accordingly, they would like to keep him in Hamburg. The only question is whether Tottenham want to let him go. The Croatian’s development and his incredibly beautiful goal of the month will also have been recorded there.
The 15th TdM for HSV
For Hamburger SV, this is the 15th goal of the month in almost 55 years of this competition. The first was achieved in May 1972 by legend Manfred Kaltz. In the all-time table, Hamburg are now in 11th place behind 1. FC Kaiserslautern.
Source: Red/Markus Wessel