It’s been a long road to the FIFA World Cup which concluded on July 15 with France being crowning champions of the world over the 32 teams that qualified and the 100 or so that failed to do so.
Without a doubt, it was one of the weirdest tournaments to happen in recent years with some of the strongest teams in the world failing to get out of the group stage, such as former world champions Germany and other contenders such as Spain and Portugal failing to make it out of the last 16.
Some powerhouse teams even failed to qualify, such as the Netherlands losing out to France and Sweden on goal difference in their qualification group. Sweden then went on to upset Italy 1-0 in two legs during UEFA’s second round of qualification.
Second-place Croatia also had to go two legs against Greece to get their fifth birth in the World Cup. Croatia is an emerging superpower in the world of soccer. After leaving Yugoslavia in 1991, the country has appeared in five World Cups out of the seven that have occurred between 1994 and 2018. In those five tournaments, they have a record of 11-4-8 and a third (1998) and a second-place finish. Oddly enough, in 1998 they also lost to France during the semi-finals 2-1.
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Croatia also has had some success in the UEFA European Championship, only missing out on qualifying for the tournament in 2000 but appearing in five tournaments with their highest finish being fifth in 2008.
The young footballing country will also play against England and Spain in Group 4 of the UEFA Nations League which will make its debut this year. The tournament is split into four leagues with four groups each. The highest calibre of countries are in the League A, and the winners of the four groups will play off to see who will be crowned champions of the tournament. Winners of the three lower leagues will be promoted, while losers of all four leagues (except the lowest) would be relegated.
Some of the teams in League A show how the world of soccer is changing with Belgium, Iceland, Switzerland and Poland in the mix. Belgium was perhaps one of the most entertaining teams in the 2018 World Cup, especially with young budding stars such as captain and Chelsea’s forward Eden Hazard and goalie Thibaut Courtois and Manchester United’s Romelu Lukaku.
Even with big-name power, Belgium managed to be a cut above some of the bigger teams such as Germany because they played as a unit instead of individuals and were rewarded with third place after beating England 2-0.
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