It wasn’t pretty. It wasn’t pretty at all. But in the end, Croatia made it to the World Cup in Brazil.
How did they do it? In the most unimpressive fashion ever.
The only teams Croatia beat during qualifying were Macedonia (2x), Wales (2x), Serbia and Iceland. They lost to Scotland not once, but twice and were held scoreless in Iceland during their first playoff leg.
But no one will care about any of these pathetic results come seven months time when Croatia is playing in front of the world. But now the question is: who will Croatia play?
The 2014 World Cup draw will take place December 6th. Let’s look at Croatia’s best/worst scenarios.
With Belgium and Switzerland squeaking into the top 7 and earning seeds at the 2014 World Cup, it leaves European power houses Netherlands and Italy in Croatia’s pot, which means the Vatreni cannot play these teams in group play along with England, Portugal, Greece, Bosnia or Russia.
With hosts Brazil topping the seeded Pot 1 with Spain, Germany, Argentina, Columbia, Uruguay and Belgium, every other country in the draw is gunning to be drawn with Switzerland, who are arguably the weakest team by far in the pot. Unless Croatia get paired with the Swiss or Belgians, they will be aiming for second place in the group stage.
In Pot 2 we have the Asian and North American teams; the weakest pot in the draw which consists of Japan, Iran, South Korea, Australia, U.S.A, Honduras and Mexico. If Croatia can avoid a Jurgen Klinsmann led American team and revamped Mexico side, they should be fine. Every other team is absolutely beatable.
Pot 3 is where things get tricky. It consists of African teams Ghana, Algeria, Ivory Coast, Nigeria and Cameroon with the last two unseeded South American sides Ecuador and Chile. It also holds European wild card France, who have been put in this Pot as the lowest ranked UEFA side to qualify. Unless Croatia draw Switzerland from the seeded pot, their opponents from Pot 3 will determine their World Cup fate. Get paired with a speedy Ghana or Ivory Coast side and Croatia will have an uphill battle to qualify for the knockout round. Pot 3 is no joke and that’s where we should focus our attention. Algeria is the weakest team here.
Toughest group for Croatia: Brazil, Mexico, Ghana/Chile.
Weakest group: Switzerland, Iran, Algeria.
Brazil is overrated they have done nothing in a World Cup since 2002 they are resting all their hopes and dreams on Neymar, Oscar and the average Joe’s they have in their team same goes for Argentina Messi plus average Joes. Messi does not perform well for Argentina he hasn’t got the Barcelona Spanish squad around him at international level. Bring on France,Italy,USA,Australia anyone except for Spain or Germany. Brazil is only favourites because they are home.
so landon hair line donovan vs ivan hairline raktic
that would be the hairline before the game, get it hairline
oh boy that was bad
Landon “Hairline” Donovan
http://is.gd/2NJZDx
I go with Cro all the way. Vatreni would definetly beat the USA.
I know the US team I alright but I can’t ever look at them as a soccer Nation…maybe if they prove me wrong I’ll change my opinion. I hardly know any of their players but from what I do know I don’t find them dynamic or exciting….throw in the fact that Donovan is the most recognizable player along with Altidore and that guy from Fulham….I just can’t relate to them. Even teams like Man U where one Korean brings attention to his team I find the US doesn’t have that association with big name player and the “I just have to watch this guy” factor! Everyone knows Chicharito, Dos Santos and Vela…the last name I remember the US boasting about was Lalas!
US may prove me wrong, I just associate them with baseball, basketball and football…nothing there to grab my attention!
Sorry Ziva!
Croatia all the way i am cro american but Croatia thats my football nation. Hockey america all the way nogomet born in usa but Croatian blood and passion
You let me down Ziva. You were supposed to say the American TV viewer would get a chance to look at Rakitic heading a ball and get a good laugh.
Cro all the way, but that is the last draw I would want to see.
The only positive would be the amount of media attention it would draw here in the US. Plus, the American TV viewer would get a chance to look at Rakitic’s hair and get a good laugh.
For the Cro-Americans, if Croatia draws the US, who do you root for? For me I’d go for Croatia first. It would be a tough game for me to watch as I love both teams.
Ziva – Simply pointing out the facts as Mexico has been mentioned quite often on this site with very high regard truth be told.
Defeating Mexico on a regular basis is nothing special because they are nothing special.
Agreed……….
But, to be fair, our group in 98 was historically weak.
If Cro drew the USA, I would be OK with it as its a team I think we can beat. If we played 10 times, i think we beat the US 6 or 7 times.
Ziva- USA is a decent team, but they aren’t someone that I classify to avoid. They are very beatable and still lack players, who can play on a high level. They have had success, but their groups have been weak when they went through.
Remember all the hype in 06? They fell flat on their faces for the most part.
@The Fonz………i don’t think anyone here is defending Mexico and calling them a football power. They are a power in the youth ranks but none of that has taken place at the senior level.
Mexico is the most overrated team in World Cup history and there is this misconception that they are a football power. Which is simply not true.
For a team that is supposed to be so great why is it that in 14 World Cup appearances they have never went to the semifinals? Croatia has already done so, and in those 14 World Cup appearances they have made the quarters only twice. That is laughable.
The only reason Mexico beat Croatia in 2002 was because of the red card on Zivkovic. If he was not such a bone head, the worst case scenario is we have a tie game.
It must be nice to have Mexico as an opponent in order to qualify for the World Cup as they are overrated beyond explanation.
@Allen Steven-Outraged………fair enough, but you do realize the US has done better at the World Cup since our 98 run. We have two appearances and two group stages bye-byes. The US has three appearances, two visits to the knockout stage, a win in the knockout stage and a blown hand ball call away from almost making it into the semifinals. Would we beat them in a head-to-head matchup? I think so, but the US are no pushover at the WC. Last I checked the US was making knockround appearances with its current generation of players. We have not. In fact we were busy losing to the likes of Mexico, a team the US easily handled in the same WC. Again, don’t let the facts get in the way of a flawed argument.
@NK Susak……hmmm, good question. I doubt you need any help from me based on the jock sniffing collection you already possess, so go on ahead and pick whoever you want. To make yourself look even more like a douche, why not a grab a jersey of our youngest players. For example get Kovacic. That way you can dance around wearing the last name of another person on your back who is probably close to half your age.
agree with you poglavnik… we all know over and over we shit the beds with teams we should beat… and its just not this squad its been like that forever
bring on the big boys and let them think we ain’t got shit right now… thats when you go in for the kill honeybadger style;)
we are way better as being the underdog and its not known around the soccer world about our struggles as of late and our new and inexperienced coach
while when you think of it… we have one of the top strikers in german league, 2 of the more elite mid fielders in spain, and now with lovren yes its early but one of the better defenders in spain… we ain’t a team full of studs but we for sure have enough there if mixed and clicking right to beat any team in the world on any given day
like our boy cico says PEACE OUT!!
The only teams that scare me are the teams we should beat.
Ante saying USA is a tough test is pretty laughable. I’d love to see Croatia destroy them and their terrible fanbase. I could never support US soccer, will forever be a joke. They will never do anything major in a big tournament.
As for teams to avoid, just please no Australia. I’m part Australian just like everyone’s hero Big Joe Simunic, so I don’t want that to occur. 2006 was so hard to watch.
Looking at that draw, we can pretty much eliminate teams from Pot 2 and 3 from going to the Semis. France has struggled with internal tensions and is just waiting to explode.
The smart money would be on the WC winners coming from Pot 1 and Pot 4.
I would love to play an African team. We’ve never played one in the WC. We would do well against them. They tend to play an open, wild, attacking style. Which would allow us to hit them on the counter–our specialty.
It’s also better everyone underestimates us. This way we take’em by surprise! We wear the underdog tag a whole lot better.
@Ziva
Any ideas on who I should add to my jocksniffing collection once these new jerseys come out? I already have 3 Modric jerseys, 1 Olic, 1 Rakitic, 1 Mandzukic, 1 Petric, 1 R. Kovac, 1 Boksic, and I almost forgot about my Marko Babic one. Whos jock is currently most sniffable? Your input and opinion really means a lot to me. Thanks
Mandzukic will not play against CSKA tomorrow – calf injury
sweeet!
@Adame…….yes, new jerseys are coming. They should be unvieled soon (any day now) by Nike and the savez.
The teams you want to avoid from the first group are South American foursome – Brazil, Colombia, Uruguay, and Argentina.
Not only would they have local support, but, each squad has deadly forwards that would give our defense fits.
Colombia with Radamel Falcao (Monaco) and Jackson Martinez (Porto – the next big star), Uruguay – Luis Suarez (Liverpool) and Edison Cavani (PSG) would probably be tougher to play against than the talented Brazilians or Argentines.
Anyone know if Croatia will be playing with new jerseys on next summer?
The US announcers make me laugh:
I can see us being in the top three weakest, but not the weakest. If they weren’t all British pundits hired for their accent, the smart person would say that England is the weakest team in our group. England have consistently under performed at every major event that they’ve been a part of.
thats the spirit guys bring em all on, in that case bring on belgium, Mexico/Australia and ecuador i want revenge and if they beat us again then i bow my hat to those teams 🙂
yep, we are in it. To me, it doesn’t matter who we draw. You eventually have to beat someone.
Maybe we get some luck like we did in 98, but as long as we are in it is all that matters to me.
We made it, at this point we have to be focused on beating every team that will be in Brazil.
I’m not worried about drawing tough teams outside of Pot A. We fare much better against teams who choose to play open and try and score on us.
Also, if we draw multiple tough teams, they still have to play each other, which works to our advantage as well. It will all just come down to who is the most consistent in the three games played.
I’d rather take this scenario over the ‘expected to win’ tournament games we’ve had in the past against teams like Japan, Austria, Switzerland, Ecuador, etc.
It’s true that europeans generally don’t perform well in other conitnents from what i can recall.. won’t be easy for any of them..
BUT .. the pots aren’t terrible to us.. look at the teams in our own pot.. we don’t have to worry about holland, italy, england etc.. which is nice for a change.. okay, we could get spain again and knowing our luck we probably will.. but we have a chance..
@Iggy………….lets wait until the draw comes out before you put words in my mouth about how we will finish. You’ll recall I did say our World Cup qualifying group was going to be won by Belgium and we were fighting for second place. I think I got that one correct.
Any S. American squad on S. American soil scares me. That will be a home game against us because they will have more support in the stadium. I rather have any of the European teams in our group from Pot 1.
@dinamodenis
I think your right, that would be the group of death for us.
Chile also scares me, they really impressed me last time.
I got a sneaking suspicion we will draw the chileans.
Toughest would be
Croatia
Brazil
France
USA
I watched one of them soccer talk shows over the weekend and the commentators were talking best and worst case scenarios for USA. They all agreed that Croatia would be in their group would be easiest draw from our pot, which is understandable considering our qualifying campaign. I must admit it sucked to hear that and how far we have fallen, but it might be a good thing for us. For the first time ever in a major tournament we’ve qualified for, nobody is considering us to be the dark horse team that no one wants to play. Hopefully, a team or two underestimates us and we get into the knockout phase where anything can happen. And I’m one of those that’s hopes we do draw the US in our group. It’s the World Cup, I ain’t gonna sit here and hope for a bunch of weak teams. Bring on Brazil or whoever and let’s see what kovac can do
are you guys going to do a mock draw?
exactly poglavnik… we all know we can take the big teams… and if we go out in 3 with good competitive games i would be happy play big teams then lesser known ones… which imo is not necessarily easier for us knowing generally how we play to our opponents
but of course playing the big teams and then there is probably a certain amount of favouritism… lets say we draw brazil and its last game like we had against spain… you think we could get a close call… hell no
even if we got spain in our group im sure the boys would love another crack at em
Kind of sucks we wont get a shot at BiH, ENG, GRE, or POR til the knockout rounds cuz they’re in our pot.
Other good teams I’d like a shot at, FRA, GER, ITA, BRA, ARG, shit I feel like I only want the good teams!
Japan don’t worry me
I saw them play their games against aus – these are competitive games – and they were majorly unimpressive, same aus team that lost 6-0, 6-0 like a bad tennis match to france and brazil held their own against the japs and japs were lucky to draw one of those games 1-1 with a last minute penalty.
Okay they did alright in friendlies but who knows what teams played in those friendlies.. i think we can beat japan.. i think usa would be harder personally (tho i know many on this site would love to see it, as i would cro vs aus)
hahaha.. MAN IMAGINE THAT
CRO VS AUS to go thru to next round AGAIN and BIG JOE SIMUNIC playing in it just like last time !!! !
That could be so interesting given the news this week about za dom et al.. man.. id almost LOVE to see another huge game between cro and aus..
only difference is these days joe would have less guys he can speak to in croatian on the aussie team than in ’06
They should avoid Japan in pot 2 too. Japan recently beat the Belgian in a friendly game (really overplayed them) and played 2-2 against Holland.
Some other news: Belgium newspaper are talking about Ivan Santini. Samporia new coach Mihailjovic really wants Santini at the winter break. Wait and see.
If we did draw swiss, honduras and algeria
How much money do u want to bet Ziva would still be saying we are favourite to finish last in the group, the other teams are all technically better than us and we’ll lose every game ??
Belgium, Australia, Algeria, Croatia
This might be optimal!
just HIT Ghana South Korea and Brazil
i dont like them ALL !!
we dont have it that bad, teams in pot two and then 3 have it the worse there is no way a team from pot two can make it to semis i think.
Pot one im hoping for in weakest order:
Swiss, Uruguay, Belgium, Columbia,
Pot two:
Bring em all on, even Mexico i would love to get revenge for the bs win over us in the 2002 World Cup
Pot three:
Algeria, Cameroon, Nigeria/Chile/Ecuador
Pot one will be most important and then in pot 3 to avoid France and Ghana anything else i dont care After pot one 🙂
Great article btw