July 1st belongs to the goalkeepers: five things we learned from Croatia’s shootout win vs. Denmark

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After a dull and heavy-going match, Croatia beat Denmark 3-2 on penalties after drawing 1-1.

The game started at a furious pace, with Denmark taking the lead inside a minute. Croatia answered back before we had five minutes on the clock and it looked like a classic was coming along. But in the end the game settled down into a miserable struggle where, if anything, Denmark were the better side and deserved to go through.

What did we learn?

1. July 1st Again aka the art of saving penalties

Many people put penalties down as a lottery, it’s an overused cliché. But they’re not, there’s a lot that goes into a penalty shootout and whilst everyone focuses on scorers and assumes that any save is simply the result of an error on the part of the taker, that too is untrue. There is an art to saving penalties, and Kasper Schmeichel and Danijel Subasic are two of the finest artists out there.

Before we even got to the shootout, we had a penalty in normal time. Luka Modric stepped up with just five minutes left in extra-time. His penalty was saved as Schmeichel had done his research andread his eyes. Then we came to the shootout, and again Subasic and Schmeichel traded blows, almost as though the takers became incidental. Whenever Subasic would pull off a save, Schmeichel would answer.

Obviously the rise in video analysis has helped goalkeepers become better at saving penalties because they can know where a specific taker is likely to put the ball, but there’s more to it than just that. There’s an attitude you need to have, where you need to seem like a larger-than-life figure. You need to induce panic in the taker; so do things like dive wholeheartedly to the side you expect the taker will go; but keep your legs active to sweep up any poor penalties that go down the middle (that’s also how Russia got their big shootout win earlier in the day).

In the end, Subasic and Schmeichel both saved three penalties in the game, although Subasic’s all came in the shootout as Croatia triumphed. Ivan Rakitic scored the winning penalty, a cool-as-ice effort to send Schmeichel the wrong way; but the hero of the night was Subasic. This is just the second time that a goalkeeper has saved three penalties in a World Cup shootout, the first? Back in 2006 when Portugal defeated England. Ricardo was the hero then, and the date? July 1st.

2. Croatia’s superb structure stifled

Spain crashed out of the World Cup earlier today largely in part because they couldn’t add any sort of threat to their constant possession. Spain owned the ball against the hosts, playing over 1000 passes, but barely tested Igor Akinfeev. Croatia meanwhile had similar levels of domination and controls whilst also posing a genuine threat all through the first half. Why? Structure.

Croatia’s team is superbly structured. They have three top quality midfielders, each with a different style. Modric is the conductor, Brozovic the defender and Rakitic the energiser, providing help wherever his side need him. Spain have similar, but what they don’t have is two traditional wingers like Ivan Perisic and Ante Rebic. These two pull defences wide and have the athleticism and technical skill to stretch opponents and create danger, or create space so that their full-backs can create danger.

If you noticed the pattern there, then you may be Denmark coach Age Hareide. The Norwegian tactician switched his efforts at half-time, bringing on Lasse Schone and using wingers and full-backs to pin the Croatian wide-men in their own half. This had the effect of isolating an immobile Mandzukic up-front, where his natural instinct to press and associate saw him often drop deep to work, which often meant there was no threat trying to stretch the Danish defence. It also prevented the Croatian midfield from dominating, as they were pushing too high to try and support their striker instead of dominating from deep.

3. Knudsen’s lethal long throws

Croatia were supposed to beat Denmark with ease, especially because Spain threw their World Cup away and lost to Russia earlier in the day, thus completely opening up Croatia’s chances of making the semi-final should they get past Denmark. And how could they not? Sure, Denmark are hard to beat, but Croatia have way too much individual talent and team cohesion.

Well the best way to destabilise a superior side is to do something strange. Something that will have them as confused as they are afraid. Step forward Ipswich Town’s Jonas Knudsen and his lethal long throws. Knudsen’s delivery is so potent and accurate that the first time Croatia had to face it, they flailed badly and Zanka Jorgensen appeared at the back-post to give Denmark a shock lead!

Sure, Croatia equalised soon after, but the tone had been set. Any time Denmark got a throw-in, normally the most harmless set-piece, you could see panic ripple through the Croatian side. Suddenly all their concentration went from playing good attacking football and their next counter to simply surviving the next throw-in. This continued throughout the game (throw-ins are easy to get); a constant jab in the face any time Croatia tried to get themselves in rhythm.

4. UEFA does not have the sauce

Euro 2016 was a poor, poor tournament. It highlighted the fact that UEFA as a confederation doesn’t really have a lot of exciting pulsating teams if their elite sides aren’t firing. That trend carried over into the 2018 World Cup, where an exciting group stage series of games without a 0-0 was broken the second two UEFA teams played each other with nothing to play for (France vs. Denmark).

And now we’re four games deep into the round of 16, and the two ties that involved inter-confederation action (France-Argentina and Uruguay-Portugal) were pulsating encounters that offered thrills and spills and great football. Meanwhile the two matches involving only UEFA nations have been dour defensive nonsense.

That word dour is key, because Uruguay are an incessantly defensive side; but they are fun to watch still. Denmark put the brakes on Croatia (one of UEFA’s finest representatives) but did so in an interminably insufferable way. On the plus side, there’s just one more all-UEFA tie left in this round. And although the quarter-final will feature two all-UEFA ties, one of them feature England who are at least one of Europe’s most expansive and entertaining nations.

5. The path to the final is clear

Before the tournament, being in this half of the draw was a real problem. You were going to have to go through Spain or Germany, the last two teams to win the World Cup. Croatia were great in Group D, but winning it had the unintentional effect of putting them in this nightmare half of the draw. It was a bleak prospect. But then Germany crashed out in the group stages, and one quarter opened up. But Croatia would still have to get past Spain in the semi-final.

But then today Spain bottomed out of the World Cup to Russia. And now it’s wide open. In this half of the draw is just one former World Cup win (England in 1966) as opposed to eight on the other side. England are also the only finalist on this side, and even in terms of semi-finalists the last one was Croatia themselves in 1998. This is an incredible chance for any of these countries, but Croatia in particular – who look as cohesive and complete a team as anyone else besides Uruguay.

The post July 1st belongs to the goalkeepers: five things we learned from Croatia’s shootout win vs. Denmark appeared first on Squawka News.



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