One reason every team at the World Cup can win
By Ty Finch
Croatia: Controlling the midfield
Despite of their recent success on the pitch and talent across the board, Croatia have struggled mightily in the World Cup apart from their first foray in 1998, when they finished third overall. Since then, they’ve never made it out of the group stage and only have two wins.
Croatia have talented players in every position, but they’ve had a propensity to fall apart in crucial moments or play down to their competition. This was apparent in their qualification, where they lost to Iceland and Turkey back-to-back and drew to Finland, who finished second to last in qualifying. This forced an early exit from their manager Ante Cacic.
However, where they excel when they’re on top of their form, and can frustrate any team in the world, is in the middle of the pitch. Croatia boast two of the best central midfielders in the world in Ivan Rakitic and Luka Modric, as well as an exciting up-and-comer Mateo Kovacic. Those three can control the tempo of any game and can completely change the outcome with a single pass.
Their play, as spotty as it was at times in qualifying, saw Croatia give up the fewest goals in their group with four in 10 games. Combining with Mario Manduzic’s hold-up play, there might not be a better team to see out a 1-0 victory than Croatia. In a group where there’s no clearly superior team, they could set their sights on a first-place finish, which would greatly help their chances of making a deep run for the first time since 1998.