Croatia

El Flaco

Active member
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[MENTION=16775]dakt[/MENTION] [MENTION=12202]Stric[/MENTION] [MENTION=16942]BBZ8800[/MENTION] [MENTION=19742]vlad[/MENTION] [MENTION=20802]MasChe[/MENTION] [MENTION=18748]blaugrana1987[/MENTION] [MENTION=14062]Gaudi[/MENTION] [MENTION=19453]MaxY[/MENTION]

Croatians: Out of curiosity, what's your thoughts about this squad? :)
 

dakt

Active member
[MENTION=16775]dakt[/MENTION] [MENTION=12202]Stric[/MENTION] [MENTION=16942]BBZ8800[/MENTION] [MENTION=19742]vlad[/MENTION] [MENTION=20802]MasChe[/MENTION] [MENTION=18748]blaugrana1987[/MENTION] [MENTION=14062]Gaudi[/MENTION] [MENTION=19453]MaxY[/MENTION]

Croatians: Out of curiosity, what's your thoughts about this squad? :)

I dunno. Name and talent wise it's very strong squad, but football is more then that. Euro will tell.
Glad to see Pjaca and Coric on the list, hope they will get their chance.
 

BBZ8800

Senior Member
Croatians: Out of curiosity, what's your thoughts about this squad? :)

I love stats and history, and our country is always high in expectations in majority of sports, and more or less same things repeat all the time.

In the 21st century, these are our results:
Wc 2002: group stage KO
Euro 2004: group stage KO
Wc 2006: group stage KO
Euro 2008: 1/4
Wc 2010: --
Euro 2012: group stage KO
Wc: 2014: group stage KO

We do have a few good individuals, but majority of the team is, imo, just meh.
Add stats/history into that, and I don't have too high hopes.

Further, our federation is corrupted, players from Dinamo's owner Mamic needs to play...

I will be happy (and surprised) even if we promote to a knockout stage.

Also, with our team and mentality, be prepared to watch at least 1 world class performance from our team.
And then, be prepared to see AT LEAST one horrible performance only 3 days later.
Our form can go up and down in only 3 days the same as Neymar's form in October and May.

I do have some hopes in young Pjaca, if he will be ready after a long injury.
He has some "magic".

 
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Darko

New member
I hate Pjaca, selfish as hell and no end product.

The squad is a joke, why the hell do we need 4 keepers, and what's Antolić doing there?
And who the hell is Ćaleta-Car?
Mamić working his magic again, instead of Eduardo, Pašalić, Caktaš we get Antolić, Ćorić and Livaković.
 

JamDav1982

Senior Member
Not a Euro 2016 thread so thought will ask here...

What will the Croatian starting line up be in your opinion?

Who will get the goals/assists?

Asking this as have a Fantasy Football league going with friends and dont quite know the starting line ups for teams and looking for bargains!

Would ask this to everyone on another thread. Same questions for each country is possible.
 

BBZ8800

Senior Member
Not a Euro 2016 thread so thought will ask here...

What will the Croatian starting line up be in your opinion?

Who will get the goals/assists?

Asking this as have a Fantasy Football league going with friends and dont quite know the starting line ups for teams and looking for bargains!

Would ask this to everyone on another thread. Same questions for each country is possible.

It seems that we play for years with 451:
[video]http://www.skysports.com/football/croatia-vs-bulgaria/teams/309138[/video]
(Muscat is Pjaca, I don't know why it says Muscat)

If fit, Mandzukic should be a lone forward.
Pjaca played in the starting 11, but now that is questionable, due to a long injury this spring.

In a 5-men midfield, Modric, Rakitic and Perisic will always play 100%.
Srna is sometimes a Rb, sometimes a MR.
Other 2 midfield places will be: Pjaca (if fit), Kovacic, Brozovic, Badelj or Antolic.

If we'll play with 2 Fcs sometimes, a 2nd guy will be Kalinic and maybe Kramaric with some minutes.

Imo, don't expect too much from Halilovic, Coric, Rog and other youngsters.
Pjaca should get the highest amount of minutes.

In fact, Coric will maybe get some minutes since our NT coaches always need to "hype" Dinamo Zagreb's youngsters so that the owner Mamic could get better transfer-prices later.

Expect Halil only if we are losing and if a coach is desperate, or if we will have lots of injuries on the right side (Srna and random central midfielders).
Don't put Halil in your fantasy team.

If you want a safe bet, play Modric, Rakitic, Mandzukic, Perisic, Corluka, Srna.
But again, they are probably expensive (in that fantasy game), they won't score (except Mandzo and maybe Raki), plus, if Croatia will play hot and cold as usual, you won't earn too much points on our players, and you will spend a lot of credits on them.
** Oh, for some reason, Perisic ALWAYS scores goals.
If he is cheap, he is worth a shot.

Here you can check who is scoring goals and who is cheap in your fantasy game and worth a shot:

(We have a new coach since the last 2 matches of qualifying rounds)

Maybe you should spend more credits on some players (attackers or wingers) who's team will progress to quarters or semis.
 
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JamDav1982

Senior Member
Cheers BBZ.

It is the Macdonalds Uefa FF game we are playing in which you can change whole team for knock out stages so dont need to worry too much about how far they go.

Raki, Modric and Perisic all 7.5m.

Think I will go with Perisic.

What will the defence be?
 

BBZ8800

Senior Member
What will the defence be?

Srna is a RB for the last 10-15 years.
A coach kicked out Lovren, so Cbs should be Corluka and Vida (Schildenfeld as the 3rd option probably).

Pure LB is only Strinic, but Vrsaljko can play on both wings.
On a LB position, we tried tons of players in the last few years, none of them worked good.
Our first pick, Pivaric is injured for 6 Months.

So, it is hard to tell. Strinic played in the past, but was left out of the squad for a few years, now he is back.
Vrsaljko is always a sub, never a starter.

Srna-Corluka-Vida should be safe bets (especially Srna+Corluka with 100%).
Vida should be infront of Schildenfeld as a Cb, and on a LB, it is hard to tell.

Also, this coach played only 4 matches with NT team, plus he is corrupted, so you can never be 100% sure what he will do (based on what Al Capone Mamic will tell him).
 

MasChe

New member
Our team is a weird one. The best players are usually those you least expect. When an outsider looks at a line up he probably thinks: "Wow, Rakitic, Modric, Mandzukic, Kovacic, Halilovic. That's a great squad, so much talent. All Barça, Real, Juve players. Great clubs -> great players"

Well, not exactly.
Second class stars, such as: Perisic and Brozovic often perform better than those from above. Especially Perisic who always gives his all, and if I were to bet my money on who will score or get an assist, it's him 90%. Other 10% would be Mandzukic, as he is our lone striker, and he should score. People were quite mad at him in the last qualifying rounds, and wanted Kalinic instead, because he was scoring plenty for Fiorentina at the time. But anyway I would still always pick Mandzukic.

Brozovic for example, gets more playing time than Kovacic for their clubs, so he has slightly better chances to be in a starting line up. Although Kova has twice the talent of Brozovic, somehow the latter performs a tad better. Brozovic is more of a runner, and when you look at it that way, we need someone like that in our XI, You can't have just a team of playmakers. (My heart says Kovacic, but brain would probably pick Brozovic.)

Our CB pairing Corluka-Vida is better than anyone would expect. Sure expectations are all-in on Raki, Modric and Mandzo, but hey, those two work very well. I love Vida, he too gives his all.

There's a curious case of Dejan Lovren. Ever since he is in Liverpool, he gets benched. He would fuck something up, english media would slaughter him, people here would mock him and he couldn't get anywhere close to first XI as a result. But he is doing well now under Klopp, and he expected (demanded) to be a starter, and got kicked out.

People are always talking about Vrsaljko and Jedvaj as our future in defence, but they have a hard time kicking Srna (kind of like our Alves, but is a captain as well. He has given plenty for NT, and is usually underwhelming due to age, but he does something good for once, and he is untouchable again) and any of the 2 CBs out of our XI.

Pjaca will probably be a starter, but he is sooo hyped, and I just don't see what everyone sees in that kid. He is Dinamo player and boss needs to sell him big, so that's probably the reason.
Seriously he is always in the media it makes me sick.

LB- we're fucked. It seemed like our definite choice would be Pivaric, but he got injured. He too like Lovren used to get shit from fans, but did played few great games, and it looked set, but now we're in shit (Strinic).

So that's pretty much our XI review imo.
 

CuleLife4Life

Active member
Maybe its Modric, Raki, and Kova (all three of whom I like) but to me Croatia always seems like its bursting with talent and just a tournament away from a trophy. Sucks to see it marred by incompetence.
 

Gaudi

Senior Member
Good squad but lacks top strikers, Mandzukic is not that kind, he's box killer...and our top midfielders are playmakers or box to box players, Modrić does that great but he has top front three in the club, Rakitić is the same story.
But having said all that, main problem is atmosphere around entire NT.
 

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