The first international break of the year is upon us and Croatia will begin their Euro 2020 qualifying campaign against Azerbaijan on Thursday – 3:45PM (ET) kickoff – from Zagreb before heading to Budapest Sunday to take on Hungary. The Azerbaijan match can be see on ESPN3.com in the United States.
With Slovakia and Wales wrapping up the Group E list of teams, on paper, Croatia should cruise through this group without a loss. However, as we know from experience, the Vatreni never make it that easy.
The top two teams in the group automatically go to Euro 2020. Te rest go home. There will not be a playoffs.
With Azerbaijan on Thursday, Croatia manager Zlatko Dalić will be able to experiment with the up-and-comers. Vlašić, Brekalo, Ćaleta-Car all come to mind.
However, a rumor out of Zagreb is saying that Wolfsburg’s Josip Brekalo – who usually plays as a striker or winger – will replace the injured Šime Vrsaljko at right back.
If that’s the case, plenty of firepower is expected to be on the pitch for Croatia against Azerbaijan.
Losing 1 – 0
Truth troll is ziva istina. It’s obvious.
Truth Troll makes 3 points; the points generally obvious to anyone but the couple of folks here that are unreasonably optimistic here… and they are also fairly general in nature, so that Truth Troll can later claim he was right.
To Troll’s points.
1) things never go totally smoothly. We will screw up at some point. Every time we assume “lako ćemo” (as some are doing with this group), we manage to complicate things.
2) Dalić is not being in as good a position as a few seem to think. Another generality that is pretty much “no duh” to most. Things are not as rosy as a couple here seem to think. Our stars are aging, and many of our young guys expected to be the next big things have failed to develop as hoped.
3) unexpected things MIGHT happen on a counter attack by lesser opponents as a result of guys playing out of position. Again.. way to go out on a limb Nostradamus.
To sum it up: Truth Troll thinks we shouldn’t be as overconfident and wildly optimistic as a couple here seem to be, things MIGHT not go perfectly.
He will then at some point declare he “was right again” and everybody hated on him for it.
Making vague generalities as predictions or actual accurate statements is not why people hate you Troll. They hate you because you are a troll, a douchebag, and an asshole.
@ Iggy
It’s at 20:45 local, brate.
Nikola Jurcevic learned from the best 😉 *cough bilic*
The good news is that Nikola Jurcevic is a horrible, horrible coach and will likely mess up badly for Azerbaijan.
Hungary will be trickier. They have some new coach so we’ll see how well he prepares them.
The Truth, speaking it for a change!
Prepare yourselves for the same old song and dance.
Scoring for us will be tight but our D will be even tighter despite some glaring needs to address.
Hopefully we go a qualifying cycle without changing managers.
=U=
Za Dom
Spremni
Rob Nikada
Naprid!!!!!!!!
Dalic is being too dramatic with this fabricated RB “issue”.
He made a stink about it in the Nations League, and failed by putting Marko Rog there. Now he’s making it a thing again by talking about it and trying to experiment there again.
We have like 4 or 5 guys that can play at RB.
Domagoj Vida spent a full season playing there for Dynamo Kiev. Jedvaj is fine to play there too. I’m sure Bartolec is decent, and would be just fine. We could have easily called up someone from the HNL like Hajduk’s Josip Juranovic too…or as someone already said, we could have changed our formation as well to account for this too.
This is Azerbaijan and Hungary we are talking about.
Our success over them will be dependent on whether our core (and currently in form) offensive players in Modric, Rakitic, Perisic and Kramaric show up or not.
I don’t think Brekalo at RB will be too much of an issue since he is a legitimate IMPACT player for us. He is going to be better than Perisic by the next World Cup and we’ll be having debates over who should be starting on the wing at Euro2020 with Perisic, Rebic, Brekalo, and the several others we have coming up.
Whatever defensive issues we have against Hungary and Azerbaijan with Brekalo at RB will be outweighed by the offense he will generate.
Still, I’d rather he play at his natural position.
The fight goes on !
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=TrWC9X12gMQ
I stated a few weeks ago that kova at RB would be a great experiment that might work wonders…I never in a million years expected Brekalo there.
Getting 3 points in Hungary won’t come easy…this will be like a cup final for them and their fans,and I fear a bit of a letdown for us.
Sitting on 6 points come Monday morning would be a Pleasant surprise in my eyes.
1) the idea that Croatia shouldn’t lose a game in this group is a joke…. I’m willing to take bets they will. Let’s hope it’s not more than 2
2) dalic is not in a good position. 11 different players than would cup team. No mandzukic, vrsaljko,lovren,strinic,subasic etc. Rakitic, modric, perisic ever older and less motivated
3) i am against brekalo at right back.
I am very high on brekalo. Croatia will dominate possession against Azerbaijan. But Azerbaijan will try to sneak one in on a counter. This is more likely to occur with someone not accustomed to the defense and more likely to get out of position
What is local time for match, is it 7.45 pm or 8.45 pm? I dont need shitty US time that helps no one
Yay we’re back in proper action! Looking forward to seeing us dishing out some beltings : )
@ Great Anon Doom
Funny thing is, I was actually thinkin’ the same thing!
First the Brekalo story gets leaked to the media. And I can’t help but think he’s got sometin’ up his sleeve!
All the best coaches are Masters at utilizing the “Element of Surprise.” Being one step ahead of the competition is all it takes.
@ Soul Champ
The math is quite simple: Dynamic + Creative = Victory
Dalić is in the best position of his tenure as national team coach.
Implement some new ideas and new players.
The CORE is solid and are able to work with fine tune adjustments.
Many teams will try and bunker.
We need to be dynamic and creative.
Also D can shift to cover full back runs?
We are the most intelligent footballers on the planet.
We need maximize our group genius, it is our greatest strength.
Vatreni .. hosting Azerbaijan “land of fire!”
Tomorrow we will find out if Dalic is playing a trick on everyone. He has recently said that a bunch of players wouldn’t be playing against Azerbaijan because of injury. He also said that he had a plan for Rog at RB, also that he has a plan to use Bartolec, and now the Brekalo story. We might see something unexpected tomorrow because that’s how Dalic works.
I say no to Brekalo at RB. Yes, it is important for full-backs to be able to attack, but it is more important that they are able to defend. From what I’ve seen, his defense is weak. If we are that desperate, just play a 3-5-2 with him playing the right wing-back role and Perisic in the other one. I prefer just putting Vida there and starting Caleta-Car and Lovren (in the Hungary game). Azerbaijan should be an easy win regardless, so I wouldn’t 100% be against Brekalo at RB since they are just going to bunker, but he could also get caught on the counter. Just give Bartolec another shot in my opinion.
@ Poglavnik
4/6 forwards listed I would categorize as wingers rather than midfielders.
Also, for weaker teams such as AZB and HUN, Brekalo at RB is do-able.
Lovren is a natural CDM.
Brekalo has the most game I have seen since Modrić 2006!
Full backs need to be able to attack dribble to widen the pitch a bit for technicians to operate in the middle.
Man .. sign me up for a dominant qualifying process.
Peace and balance to all my Hrvati homies during the Vernal Equinox.
Our midfield is so stacked!
We have 8 midfielder’s listed and 4/6 forwards listed are midfielders.
I agree I don’t know bout brekalo there but hey it’s early in qualifying and we should be strong nuff to beat them regardless
So I guess try it if we need
I thought it was gonna be Marko Rog at rb? Or was that lb?
“Should cruise through this group without a loss.”
Has that ever happened? Maybe once, off the top of my head.
Brekalo is listed with the forwards and he’s a left sided player. What’s next, Lovren at holding mid again?
@Razbijac Yes! It is only the beginning….Our U17 – U21 talent is incredible
I like the idea of playing Brekalo at RB. He is great with the ball and can help control the defense
Or i can just play RB since i am RB
Croatia home jersey, leading the polls at Marca.com. This is without question the most iconic kit in football.
Croatia need to make a STATEMENT to the world and qualify convincingly. The world needs to know…last summer was only the beginning…
Looking at that squad list is enough to keep any Madjar and Azeri up at night!
It’s STACKED!
Brekalo at RB is quite the idea–even though he’s a LW. In fact, it just sounds so Crazy it might even work!
Brekalo making a deadly overlap, opening up massive holes in the opposing defenses. The question is, how good is he defensively?
Also, would like to see Toma Basic eventually called up. He’s a young, tall, powerful DM that’s been getting starts a Bordeaux. I’d rather see him than Bradaric, who’s kinda fallen off the radar at Cagliari.
Keep your eyes on Basic, like a fine bottle of Bordeaux–he can only get better!
Hopefully won’t come to this, but it’s not totally true that if you don’t finish in the first two places, that you Automatically go home. There is still the playoff draw from the UEFA nations league.
Assuming that the 4 semi finalists from the nations league (Portugal, England, Switzerland, and I forgot the fourth right now) qualify for the euros directly from their groups, that will leave open up to four playoff slots for someone who didn’t qualify directly to get in through the playoff
Soul Champ is a Free Mason he posted at 3.33 just joking. We should win our first game but the second game with the Madjari away will be harder.
Josip Brekalo at RB!!
Big time move by Dalić.
Brekalo is the goods and will have the ability to penetrate any bunker.
Also can shoot from all angles.
Plus he allows to get all your best attackers on the pitch.
Dalić finally has the opportunity to being a campaign from the beginning and put his stamp on it.
And he has juggernaut crew to work with.
Cupboard is chock full of the best players in the world with a crew of young potential.
Full backs need to be offensive for us to score goals.
Teams have to attempt to crowd the middle which leaves the flanks wide open. Only this last World Cup did we finally take the space in the open flanks.
U boj ..