Breaking! Croatia vs France in World Cup Final

Posted on by Newswatchnigeria
  • FT: Croatia 2-1 England (AET)
  • England knocked out of WC
  • Trippier with superb free-kick (5)
  • Perisic draws Croatia level (68)
  • Mandzukic makes it 2-1 in ET (108)
  • 2018 World Cup semi-final
  • France v Croatia in Sunday final

Croatia on Wednesday made its first World Cup final ever, after defeating England team in the semi-final game which ended 2-1.

Croatia will play France in Sunday in the World Cup final in Moscow.

England will head to St. Petersburg for a rematch with Belgium that neither team wants in the third-place game.

 

 MATCH STATS

  • Ivan Perisic has been involved in 10 goals at major tournaments for Croatia (6 goals, 4 assists), the joint-most, level with Davor Suker (9 goals, 1 assist).
  • Kieran Trippier’s goal after 4 minutes and 44 seconds was the fastest goal scored in a World Cup semi-final since 1958 (Vava after two minutes for Brazil v France).
  • Croatia became the first team to play extra-time in three consecutive World Cup matches since England in 1990.
  • England scored nine goals from set pieces at the 2018 World Cup – the most by a team in a single World Cup tournament since 1966.
  • Four of the five 2018 World Cup matches to go to extra-time have involved either England or Croatia (the other was Spain v Russia).

PREVIEW

CROATIA TEAM NEWS

Starting XI: Subasic, Vrsaljko, Strinic, Lovren, Vida, Rakitic, Modric, Brozovic, Perisic, Mandzukic, Rebic.

CROATIA MATCH FACTS

Croatia have had eight different scorers at the 2018 World Cup – only Belgium have had more different players find the net (9).
Croatia have reached the World Cup semi-finals for the second time since their first World Cup participation in 1998, which is more than the likes of Argentina, England, Italy, Portugal and Spain (1 each). The only European nations with more semi-final appearances in this period (inc. 2018) are Germany (4), France (3) and the Netherlands (3).
Croatia reached the semi-finals via penalty shootout victories in the last 16 against Denmark and quarter-final against Russia – the only other team to win two penalty shootouts in a single World Cup were Argentina in 1990 (against Yugoslavia and Italy).
Croatia have only lost one of their six knockout matches at the World Cup, losing to France in the 1998 semi-final.

ENGLAND TEAM NEWS

Starting XI: Pickford, Walker, Stones, Maguire, Trippier, Henderson, Young, Lingard, Alli, Sterling, Kane.

Subs: Rose, Dier, Vardy, Butland, Welbeck, Cahill, Jones, Delph, Rashford, Loftus-Cheek, Alexander-Arnold, Pope.

ENGLAND MATCH FACTS

England are competing in their third World Cup semi-final; they won 2-1 against Portugal in 1966 on their way to winning the tournament, but lost on penalties to Germany in 1990.
England and Croatia have met once before at a major tournament – England won 4-2 in a group stage match at Euro 2004.
England have not beaten two European nations in a single World Cup since 1982, when they beat Czechoslovakia and France.
England have scored 11 goals at this year’s World Cup, a joint-record along with the 11 they scored in their victorious 1966 tournament.
England had 15 shots on target in their first two 2018 World Cup matches but have attempted just six in their three games since – England had eight shots on target against Portugal in the 1966 semi-final, and four in 1990’s semi-final against Germany.
Harry Kane has scored on six of the seven days of the week for England, with Wednesday the only day he hasn’t scored on. Should he score, he’ll become just the third player to score on all seven days of the week for England, after Wayne Rooney and Frank Lampard.

Related posts