A group of 33 junior football players for the Shakhtar Donetsk football club will be accommodated in the Maestral children's home in the southern Croatian coastal town of Kastel Luksic, near Split, thanks to the mediation of former football player and captain of the Croatian national squad, Darijo Srna.

“We are expecting the children to arrive from Ukraine during the day and they will be accommodated in our subsidiary in Kastel Luksic, while their arrival was mediated by Darijo Srna,” the director of the Mestral children’s home, Jelena Burazin told the Croatian state news agency Hina.

Former Shakhtar player Darijo Srna and former Dinamo player Dario Zahora appealed to the Dinamo Zagreb football club for assistance to help the young Ukrainians leave war-torn Ukraine. The club then sent a bus to the Hungarian-Ukrainian border to collect the children.