CROATIA | Group D | Team Profile | EURO 2020
England, Scotland and Czech Republic join Zlatko Dalic's Croatia in Group D of the delayed 2020 European Championships this summer.
Croatia, who lost to France in the final of the 2018 World Cup, only managed to secure five victories but still finished top of their qualification group for Euro 2020.
Croatia will be without the experienced 33-year-old Ivan Rakitic for this tournament, after the Sevilla midfielder retired from international duty last year.
Dalic, who never represented his country as a player, will be aiming to take his side further than their last European outing, which saw them exit the round of 16 stage, following a 1-0 loss after extra time to eventual champions Portugal at Euro 2016.
1. 00:01 - 00:27 SOUNDBITE (English): Zlatko Dalic, Croatia head coach:
(About the draw and facing England again)
''We are happy because we cannot expect an easy group. Now we will play against England. It will be the first game at Wembley. A repeat of the semi-final of the World Cup also, so I hope we can do it. It will not be easy because England now is a fantastic team - a very strong team, a young team. And our target is to get past the group stage. We must win two games in the group and I hope we will do it.''
2. 00:34 - 01:37 SOUNDBITE (Croatian): Zlatko Dalic, head coach, Croatia
(About the competitiveness of the team)
"As you have said, before we are standing here in front of a generational change. For us, it was important to qualify for the European Championship. We also knew that we do not have so much margin for error concerning the young players. But, at the moment, we have a mix of older and younger players. First, we have to reach the goal to give the younger players more game time. The bar is set very high with our second place in Russia (losing finalists at the 2018 World Cup). We also want to perform as good as possible at the European Championships, and there we will have to do our best."
3. 01:41 - 02:24 SOUNDBITE (English): Duje Caleta-Car, Marseille defender:
"I am expecting, of course, for us to go through the group. We have a good group with England and Scotland, and they play at home so it will be even harder for us. And, of course, the Czech Republic are getting better and better, and they have also (a) good team. So I hope that we can go through the group and then after, of course, it is one game (at a time) and we can beat anybody if it is one game. So, yeah, first of all the first game is the most important, against England, and if it is a good result then we have a good chance to (progress) in(to) the next round."
SOURCE: SNTV
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