90min

Croatia predicted lineup vs Brazil - World Cup quarter-final

By Grey Whitebloom

Zlatko Dalic and his wife attended their son’s DJ set in 2017. “We stayed all night but did not dance,” Dalic said. “It’s not really our music.”
Zlatko Dalic and his wife attended their son’s DJ set in 2017. “We stayed all night but did not dance,” Dalic said. “It’s not really our music.” / Alex Grimm/GettyImages
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Croatia are up against five-time champions Brazil in the World Cup quarter-finals on Friday afternoon.

Zlatko Dalic has taken a realistic approach to team evaluation. "There are no more attackers from Atletico and Juventus, now we have attackers from Dinamo, Hajduk and Osasuna," he bluntly outlined. "Don’t live in the clouds, we have what we have."

Well, here's the XI Dalic may select from what he has against Brazil.

Croatia predicted lineup vs Brazil (4-3-3)

Luka Modric
At 37 years of age, Luka Modric is the oldest Croatian to ever appear at a men's World Cup / Dan Mullan/GettyImages

GK: Dominik Livakovic - After saving as many as three penalties in the shootout against Japan, Livakovic understandably described that night as "the best match of my life".

RB: Josip Juranovic - Two years after collecting £150 a week Juranovic broke into the senior national team. Celtic's first-choice right-back is on a considerably more comfortable wage these days.

CB: Dejan Lovren - Zenit St Petersburg's captain isn't shy in voicing his strident views - though oddly nothing about the war in Ukraine - and lent his support to Brazil's Vinicius Junior earlier this year when the Real Madrid winger was racially abused in the wake of his dancing celebration. "Nobody can stop you," may be a line that comes back to haunt him on Friday though.

CB: Josko Gvardiol - The centre-back's surname has drawn comparisons to that of a certain Catalan coach but, for one of the tournament's best defenders, it has a more fitting origin in the Latin verb it is derived from; guardare, to guard.

LB: Borna Barisic - The son of a member of a Croatian underground criminal organisation - allegedly - who even has his own Batman-esque villain name; Stipe 'The Moth' Barisic.

CM: Luka Modric - Croatia's ageing skipper admits that he still thinks about losing the 2018 World Cup final most days.

CM: Marcelo Brozovic - Even in a team that contains Modric, everything goes through Brozovic; the Croatian player with the most passes, touches and distance covered at this World Cup.

CM: Mateo Kovacic - As a 20-year-old, Kovacic made his first World Cup start against Brazil in the opening game of the 2014 World Cup, coming off for Brozovic while the score was 1-1 before Neymar and Oscar earned the hosts a win.

RW: Andrej Kramaric - “I may lack aggression and am sometimes too cold-headed," Kramaric once conceded, "but that’s what makes scoring easier for me.”

ST: Marko Livaja - Dalic rattled through all three of his options at centre-forward across the 120 minutes against Japan. Bruno Petkovic started but was mercifully replaced by Ante Budimir who got hooked himself for Livaja - the only Croatian to miss in the penalty shootout. Three hardly persuasive cases for a starting berth.

LW: Ivan Perisic - After his picturesque header against Japan, Perisic is now the only European player to have scored and created a goal in each of the last five major tournaments, stretching back to World Cup 2014.

Harry Symeou hosts Scott Saunders, Sean Walsh, Ali Rampling and Brian Goldfarb to look back on the 2014 World Cup finals in Brazil - join us!

If you can’t see the podcast embed, click here to download or listen to the episode in full!

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