Definitely not the most ideal draw for Croatia in the Nations League semifinals, but it will do.
- This 4-team mini-tournament will be hosted in the Netherlands, so the Dutch will absolutely have home-field advantage whomever they play.
- The Dutch had the best showing at the World Cup two months ago out of Spain and Italy (did’t qualify). The Netherlands lost to Argentina in a penalty kick shootout in the quarterfinal round. The Vatreni loss 3-0 to Argentina in the semis.
Based on how 2022 ended, I believe whomever wins the Croatia/Netherlands match will end up winning the whole thing and lifting the Nations League trophy in Rotterdam. Our boys should be up for this match at the end of a long club season but we’re still five months away. Lots can change with injuries and personnel. But first, two EURO 2024 qualifiers against Wales and Turkey in March?
Will Croatia finally pick up their first international silverware this summer in Holland? Who do you want to see called up for the Nations League semifinals and what do Musa and Šimić have to do in the next half season in order to make the squad?
The second semifinal will be Spain vs. Italy. Winners will face off June 18th in Rotterdam for the 2023 UEFA Nations League crown.
Romeo Jozak could be Dinamo’s next president?
https://gol.dnevnik.hr/clanak/rubrika/nogomet/puca-savez-u-maksimiru-antolic-ostao-zabezeknut-romeo-jozak-kandidat-za-predsjednika-dinama—763096.html?itm_source=HomeTopRow&itm_medium=Dnevnik&itm_campaign=Naslovnica
Good news for Ante.
Could get some exclusive interviews.
Maybe even become a sellout media mouthpiece for Dinamo and get in on the take.
great corner from Juranovic
https://www.goalstube.online/2023/01/bremen-union.html?m=m3
We have so many players who regularly take (successful) corners for their club teams, it really makes me wonder why Luka insists on taking most of ours.
Beljo also w a goal
forget it. VAR said no goal
Ah, such a shame.
But it’s great seeing Beljo make an instant impact in the Bundesliga.
We definitely need to call him up in March if he keeps this up.
Ya making an impact
Let’s hope this continues
I like this situation where our guys are being brought into lower end teams where they can get fair shakes and especially in relegation zones. The games matter when say if you are in the middle of the league at the end of the season there isnt much to play for
Vidovic with a goal for Vitesse. Couldn’t find a clip.
https://streamja.com/EaKV5
What a goal.
Did that go straight in??
I couldn’t see too well on my tiny phone
I was just saying how we could have used olmo after his wundergol but damn that was impressive
With vidovic, Simic, beljo, musa, ljubicic
Something got to pan out
No more partiers like livaja and petko
Broz is obviously a freak of nature but the less he takes care of himself the injuries will keep coming as he ages
Growth hormone slowing down among much other factors
This is the highest level, you need to treat your body like the machine it is. They have the money and time, no excuses
It looked like he chipped it over the keeper at an extremely narrow angle…but it likely took a deflection (hard to tell in the replay).
Either way, the kid just turned 19 a month ago, and is starting/playing well in a pretty good Dutch league.
He’s being played at LW, so he may end up being a Perisic replacement for us in the future.
The legendary Phillip Cocu is his coach, and he started his career as a winger (and played multiple positions for the Netherlands).
Hopefully Cocu sees something in him. He’s been playing him every game and maybe will help develop Vidovic’s game in a similar fashion to his own.
I personally wanted to avoid them since all the games are in Holland and tbh they should be winning the tournament in those circumstances. Would’ve liked to spank Italy for an umpteenth time.
To be fair. If I had to pick any of those teams to play against in the world cup knockouts (and even if Italy played) I would pick Netherlands. The only issue we have to work with here is their home advantage. Tough game but they are beatable.
I agree on this. I actually like our matchup. Final four teams, so no easy games, but I’m happy with this.
The semi final we would have preferred would have been with Holland in qatar
It will be a good match up
I would have liked to play Italy myself but such is life
None of these games are easy like the multi million dollar man truth said below
How the heck is ivusic going to Cyprus?
I don’t watch the guy but to me he always looked pretty comfortable for the repka
He’s turning 28 and I guess Osijek wants to cash in while they can.
He probably won’t get a chance to play for the National Team again, since Livaković did so well at the World Cup. It would take at least two years of Livaković playing poorly before we’d ever demote him.
Also, Ivušić is the oldest goalkeeper out of the bunch with Livaković, Kotarski, Grbić, and Labrović all being younger. What’s worse is that there are now some other young Croatian keepers that are starting at their clubs in Pandur and Semper.
Ivusic is same age as livi 1995 hes even one month younger. Just saying hehe.
I think with this move he wont see national team anymore
Ah. For some reason I thought Livakovic was a year younger.
Either way, Ivusic won’t get another chance to regularly start. Livakovic will be given a long leash and it would take several games (over the span of a year or two) before Ivusic gets an opportunity like that again.
It’s more likely that one of our younger keepers (like Kotarski or Labrovic) end up developing further over the next several years and eventually replacing Livakovic down the road.
Hosting the game can be a double edged sword for the Netherlands. Having a packed stadium cheering on their team will be a huge boost, but if they play cautiously or our midfield controls the game then the support can go south, which can force Holland to play more recklessly. Could work out well for us.
https://www.instagram.com/p/Cn1pQCmMSsy/?igshid=NTdlMDg3MTY=
Ivusic is moving to Cyprus. Wow…..
Koeman talking about how he wants to go back to playing the traditional Dutch way:
https://www.reuters.com/lifestyle/sports/new-dutch-coach-return-traditional-tactics-2023-01-23/#:~:text=AMSTERDAM%2C%20Jan%2023%20(Reuters),during%20his%20tenure%20in%20charge.
I guess he wants to move away from the counterattacking game, and will try to dominate possession against us.
Could blow up in his face. This should be a really good game.
Also, Spain’s new coach is Luis de la Fuente, who I know very little about.
Looks like he’s pretty inexperienced at senior level, but has some successes at the junior level.
Definitely not an ideal match up playing the dutch at home. But guess what, it’s a 2 game tournament. There is going to be no easy game anywhere here. To say that if Croatia wins the first one, they’ll win the tournament is ridiculous. I don’t know why beating Italy or Spain is a given. Croatia probably has 30-40% win chance in both of those games. Maybe less by that time.
To finish on the Modric topic, I thought about it some more and concluded he should take the money. Things are so expensive nowadays at the upper range of spending. Inflation has definitely hit hard for basic goods, but it has hit the wealthy even harder. The price of things like high level houses like mansions, penthouses, beach houses has gone up a lot more percentage wise than staple costs like food. Private plane costs have double to trippled without even getting into how much the jet fuel cost has gone up. If Modric leaves his soccer career with only 50-100 million in the bank and not much prospects to make much more cause he’s not a big endorsement guy, he’s going to find himself being not much different than an upper middle class person. Decent sized main home, second home on the beach in zadar, flying commercial, watching his spending. He’ll spend about 30 million over his life. He’ll be down to 70 million. Then the government will take half in estate taxes and leave 30 million to be split between his 3 children or a small 10 million a child is what gets left to the children of the greatest midfielder of a generation. They’ll be back toiling in the polje to get by. An extra 100 million tax free will really change his life. Take it
Italy or Spain would have been better. Dutch playing at home will be hard, but you never know. The matches are in mid-June and do not clash with EURO U21 finals which start a week later. Dalic should after the NL finals send some players to Biscan such as Stanisic and Sutalo.
Dalić is already setting low expectations lol
I disagree about Spain.
They are our toughest matchup because they rely on dominating the midfield, just like we do.
If they dominate the midfield (like they did against us at Euro2020) then they win the match…and it’s pretty much a toss up as to who would be the one dominating the other. We’re better now than we were at Euro2020, but it can go either way.
Netherlands are a good team but I don’t see them outpossessing. However, they are playing at home.
They will probably try and strike us on counters, but are not on the same level (in terms of creativity and technical skills) like us and Spain.
Italy is going through a rebuild and would have been our easiest opponent. Their goalkeeper is great though and will keep them in every game. They have been defending and countering a lot against their opponents, so they would do that with us too.
We usually do extremely well against Italy, and oddly enough, Italy always seems to exchange wins and losses with Spain at a 50% clip.
I expect Spain to beat them, but maybe Italy squeezes by them like they sometimes do.
Both the Netherlands and Spain are going to have new coaches though, so we’ll see in March as a sneak-peak how well that plays out for them. Could be a significant factor.
If there is any sort of adjustment period with either of their new coaches, that will be fantastic for us.