One question for each 2026 World Cup team. Can Croatia get one last tournament out of Luka Modric, Ivan Perisic, and the rest of the gang?
Would you love me in a Bentley? Would you love me on a $95 bus from downtown Boston to Gillette Stadium? Footnote is asking 48 questions, and they’re all about the 48 teams at the 2026 World Cup. This post is part of our Group L preview. You can also read previews of England, Ghana, and Panama.
Can Croatia get one last tournament out of Luka Modric, Ivan Perisic, and the rest of the gang?
A funny thing about Croatia is that they’ve had the same group of great players forever, but it took them longer than you probably remember to actually become a good team.
Starting in the mid-2000s, waves of great Croatian players started appearing in Europe’s biggest leagues and then for the national team. Within five years from 2006 through 2011, all-time greats like Luka Modric, Ivan Rakitic, Ivan Persic, and Mario Mandzukic all broke into the Croatian setup.
This was the spine of the team that made a run to the 2018 World Cup final and then the 2022 semifinal. But first they spent a while losing: Failure to qualify for the 2010 World Cup, and group stage exits in the 2012 Euros and 2014 World Cup. It was only at the 2018 tournament that it all clicked for this Croatian generation, when Luka Modric leveled up from the secret glue to Real Madrid’s midfield to the not-so-secret best non-Messi in the world.
Now the question is if it can stay clicked for just one more tournament.
Despite a disappointing performance at the Euros two summers ago — just two points and group stage exit — head coach Zlatko Dalic is betting that it can. And it’s hard to blame him, necessarily1.Dalic, by the way, is yet another dude who has been part of this national team setup for what feels like forever. He took charge of Croatia in 2017.
If you have a chance to build your national team around Luka Modric, you do that for as long as he seems willing and able to play for your national team. And sure, he is 40 years old now, but he still managed 34 games for AC Milan last season, and in a slightly perverse way he might actually benefit from a World Cup in extreme heat.
Modric had some great performances for Milan this season in the slower pace of Italian soccer, when a lack of high ball pressure allowed him to collect the ball from the centerbacks and quarterback passes from the halfway line. In a tournament where 90 degree heat might keep games from getting too frenetic too early, Modric might have the time and space in which he can thrive.
Modric’s most likely midfield partner will be Mateo Kovacic, who spent most of this past season with Manchester City injured but got healthy just in time to play in most of the final stretch. Kovacic is still just 32, and has already made 113 appearances for the national team despite seemingly being stuck as the third fiddle to Modric and Rakitic for a huge portion of his early career. More importantly he’s a willing runner and a great dribbler, someone with a perfectly complimentary skillset to an aging Modric.
That’s a midfield that should exert some control over games, but Croatia’s biggest asset might be their defense, which is also the one place where they will start players in their 20s. Dalic has alternated between playing a back four and a back three over the past year, but all seven of the guys who rotate through those different setups are all 28 or younger.
The key player in either configuration is Josko Gvardiol, another Manchester City, who is a hugely capable technical player and able to perform as both a centerback in a three or a left back in a four.
Also, last summer Gvardiol decided to spend part of his vacation doing a weird special forces cosplay training course, which is not really important to Croatia’s chances at the World Cup, but does feel worth knowing.
That combination of young defensive adaptability, and experienced game control in midfield made Croatia extremely hard to beat in qualifying: They conceded just four goals across an unbeaten eight match campaign.
If the defense performs at that level in the World Cup, Croatia will at the very least be able to stay in games this summer. And that’s been the formula to these great runs: In both 2018 and 2022, they never let anyone build a two-goal lead against them. They were always just one moment away from an equalizer or a lead. And no one can create a moment the way Luka Modric can.
This World Cup, Croatia will need him to create just a couple more.
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