The defending champions were Hajduk Split, having won their fifth title the previous year by defeating Šibenik in the final.
Most of the top flight clubs entered the competition in the following round, played on 21 and 22 September 2010, with the exception of Karlovac and Lokomotiva, as their cup coefficient (determined by their cup record over the last five seasons) was too low to skip the preliminary round.
[1] In addition, RNK Split and Zadar, two of the top-level clubs, failed to qualify for the competition.
First round proper consisted of 16 single-legged matches, with 16 winners of the preliminary round joined by 16 clubs with the highest cup coefficients (including 12 out of the remaining 14 top-level clubs, excluding RNK Split and NK Zadar, whose cup coefficients were too low to enter competition).
It will be the last stage of the competition employing the single leg format as from the quarter-finals onwards all fixtures will be double-legged events.