Euro 2024: Cruel Croatia

With an average age of 28.19, the Croatian team is among the oldest teams in this tournament. Among them, the old men like Luka Modrić, Ivan Perišić or Andrej Kramarić are still irreplaceable pillars.

A typical example is veteran Luka Modrić, who is about to turn 39 and still has to play 235 minutes at this Euro. Being the ball transfer station, the one who creates opportunities for teammates, the one who scores the goal to light up hope for the home team. Luka Modrić is like a saint of the Croatian National Team.

However, Mattia Zaccagni's goal in the 90+8 minute made all the efforts of Luka Modrić and his teammates go down the drain. This goal pushed Croatia to 3rd place in Group B with 2 points after 3 matches and almost certainly will be eliminated.

What's more cruel is that this is the second consecutive time the Croatian team has been equalized in the final minutes. In the previous match, Luka Modrić and his teammates were also scored by Klaus Gjasula in the 90+5 minute, causing the Croatian team to only get a 2-2 draw against the Albanian team.

These two painful draws are the knives that ended the dream of conquering major tournaments of Croatia's golden generation. A golden generation that brought a lot of success to the Croatian National Team at the 2018 World Cup, Euro 2020 and the 2022 World Cup.

However, the failure in this year's final round also shows that it is time for the Croatian team to rejuvenate its squad. Because aging has caused coach Zlatko Dalić's team to run out of steam at the most important moments of the match. And the Croatian team cannot rely on old men like Luka Modrić, Ivan Perišić or Andrej Kramarić in the upcoming major tournaments.

Luka Modrić's stunned face after referee Danny Makkelie blew the final whistle was the same as the general mood of the Croatians. They did not deserve this cruelty but it is part of football./.