If there is one team that no one wants to be on a narrow ledge with, trapped in an abyss, it is Croatia, the Croatia of the endless Luka Modric and the goalkeeper, here in Qatar and four years ago in Russia. On the side when you think you’ve tripped them up that they’ll be crushed under a fatal blow, even then nobody can be trusted. Not even Brazil. Not even Neymar at that point in his career when he was convinced he had caught his big blitz at a World Cup but was left without the semifinals that Croatia will play.
With the game in overtime, just before the break, Neymar went down to look for the ball, threw a wall with Rodrygo, another with Paquetá, endured an attack from Sosa, surrounded the goalkeeper who had stopped everything and met. His all-time game, the goal that tied Pelé at 77 as the team’s top scorer in history. He received hugs during the break of extra time that encapsulated historic relief at the star of his generation overcoming an ecstasy of this caliber after a string of disappointments at the World Cup. But not. Beyond extra time and penalties, Croatia belongs. Bruno Petkovic, a 28-year-old Dinamo Zagreb striker, scored the youngest equalizer in World Cup history in the 117th minute. Pure Croatia.
Tite’s team, the ones with the smiles and the dances, met Modric’s band of sages from the start. The method can turn off the exuberance. Croatia thrive on their resistance and a midfield machine that’s the most precise football has produced. There he began to rein in the risks of the imagination. Modric, Brozovic and Kovacic played, tac, tac, tac, and then Brazil faded away, running more behind the ball than with it. A contradiction.
He suffered until Neymar started alone to put pressure on the keeper. His desperate enthusiasm upset the entire team behind him and the Croatians, the orthodoxy playing by heart, were planted in the three-walled Alisson area. Perisic was less than half a second late.
Neymar cries in midfield after losing to Croatia in quarterfinals of World Cup in Qatar ANNE-CHRISTINE POUJOULAT (AFP)
Neymar remains on the pitch heartbroken along with two other team-mates after losing to Croatia in the quarter-finals. Ronald Wittek (EFE)
. RAYAN (QATAR), 12/09/2022.- Luka Modric of Croatia celebrates his victory in a quarterfinal match of the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022 at the Education City Stadium in Rayan, Qatar today. EFE/Juanjo Martin JUANJO MARTIN (EFE)
Croatia celebrate their place in the semi-finals while Brazil’s Marquinhos regrets missing the penalty. MATTHEW CHILDS (Portal)
Croatian goalkeeper Dominik Livakovic celebrates his team’s entry into the semi-finals. MATTHEW CHILDS (Portal)
Modric scores a penalty kick in the shootout. MATTHEW CHILDS (Portal)
Luka Modric shoots his penalty kick in a penalty shootout. DPA via Europa Press (DPA via Europa Press)
The Brazilian players follow the penalty shootout. MATTHEW CHILDS (Portal)
Croatia’s Dominik Livakovic for Rodrygo’s penalty DYLAN MARTINEZ (Portal)
Neymar follows the penalty shoot-out against Croatia. Annegret Hilse (Portal)
Dominik Livakovic saves Rodrygo’s penalty. MATTHEW CHILDS (Portal)
The Brazilian team at the start of the penalty shootout HANNAH MCKAY (Portal)
The Croatian team at the start of the penalty shootout. Martin Meissner (AP)
Bruno Petkovic celebrates the goal against Brazil in the final moments of the prologue. INA FASSBENDER (AFP)
Croatia’s Bruno Petkovic scores the equalizer against Brazil.Manu Fernandez (AP)
Brazil goalkeeper Alisson looks at the ball after the Croatia equalizer. Manu Fernández (AP)
Neymar celebrates the goal against Croatia who scored the first goal.Manu Fernandez (AP)
Neymar marks Croatia. Manu Fernandez (AP)
Croatian Borna Sosa and Brazilian Antony in one set of the match. Frank Augstein (dpa)
Neymar, surrounded by Croatian players, advances onto the field. Pavel Golovkin (AP)
Neymar and Josko Gvardiol fight for the ball. Petr David Josek (AP)
Croatia goalkeeper Dominik Livakovic after a shot by Neymar. Petr David Josek (AP)
Luka Modric (left) of Croatia fights for the ball with Lucas Paqueta of Brazil during the quarter final match between Brazil and Croatia. Ronald Wittek (EFE)
Richarlison (right) in action with Josko Gvardiol’s Croatian (left). Georgi Licovski (EFE)
Luka Modric (left) and Rodrygo Goes (right) protest against a referee’s action during the quarter final match of the World Cup in Qatar between Croatia and Brazil. Georgi Licovski (EFE)
Neymar sings the Brazilian anthem before the start of the quarter-final between Croatia and Brazil. Neil Hall (EFE)
Croatia always thought everything through beforehand. When Casemiro first got in the middle and wanted to turn around, he found Modric there who took the ball from him. The Real Madrid player has never been the fastest, especially now, but he knows everything before anyone else. He had been writing his former partner, now at United, for days as a point to disable the exit from Brazil. It haunted him all afternoon. Tite’s have a lot less accuracy in the area where Croatia has the most crumbs.
Brazil’s party should defuse the harmony by spreading some chaos. Because when the rival waited in turn and they passed the ball from side to side, the insignificance made even Modric yawn. Only when Neymar fell behind could they vary the tempo, especially when he managed to score Vinicius. Thus, from time to time, they agitated Croatia, which immediately reverted to its position of governing the center. His restlessness was well within limits.
These outbursts from Neymar started too far and the Brazilian, where it is indecipherable, is closer to the area. When he first shot there, he almost left Richarlison in the small area in front of Livakovic, an impossible wall with 11 saves, several of them from close range, in addition to the first penalty against Rodrygo.
Croatia dominated the center and Brazil didn’t threaten on the flanks, where two full-backs didn’t appear, both out of position (Militão and Danilo) and they didn’t disarm the wingers. Tite chose these corridors as the first place to intervene. Antony and Rodrygo replaced Raphinha and Vinicius.
Desperate, unable to negotiate the bolts of Dalic’s scaffolding, Brazil were distressed with each step a little more than the step that removed them from what Tite had described as the plan that suited them best passed: to score a goal as quickly as possible. Circumstances collided with their impetuosity and the weight they carried from the start as they recognized themselves as favorites and were almost forced to win the World Championship. With Croatia at the top, the panorama couldn’t be more devilish. Luka Modric’s band watches undeterred as time flies by as their captain. The timer runs out and they’re not worried but play confident that if they manage to hold out, no one can last longer than them. They had only played one game without overtime since Russia went into the knockout stages, the final against France. In others they have always been imposed. As against Brazil.
There were the Croatians leading the final stretch in resistance mode, a position they don’t tremble in. And so they took the game into their domains of overtime, with Modric cutting off Rodrygo’s final counterattack, another teammate he used his false slow wisdom with. And that’s how they also survived the flash that Neymar thought he had put them down with. No one seems to know that Modrics will rule Croatia in the afterlife.
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