Croatia’s national football team played their first World Cup game in 1998, at that time they were already a free and independent nation. But before that year Croatian players made their national team debut playing for Yugoslavia in 1930.
Most of Croatia’s players are considered good players and some of them have no comparison with other players of the same position as is the case of Luka Modric named the best midfielder of the world.
Croatia are smart and strategy driven squad playing in the World Cup, they don’t tend to get desperate during the games and a clear example of that was the quarter-finals game against Brazil during the 2022 FIFA World Cup where the Brazilians were celebrating their 1-0 ‘win’ in extra time while there were still 3 minutes left on the clock. The Croats scored the equalizer to force penalty shootouts where they won and advanced to the semifinals.
Has Croatia ever won the FIFA Wold Cup?
No, unfortunately Croatia don’t have any World Cup trophies, but they came close to winning one in 1998 when they finished in third place after losing during the semifinals against France 2-1.
Another recent occasion where Croatia came close to winning a World Cup was in 2018 when they lost the final against France in Russia.
Croatia have reached the Knockout Stage only twice during their five participations (not counting Qatar 2022) in a FIFA World Cup. Only in 2010 they failed to win due to not qualifying.
