{"id":15196,"date":"2017-08-14T15:30:29","date_gmt":"2017-08-14T14:30:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thehighertempopress.com\/?p=15196"},"modified":"2017-08-15T17:00:30","modified_gmt":"2017-08-15T16:00:30","slug":"tempo-tactics-5-3-2-ciros-croatia-part-2-russia-2018","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thehighertempopress.com\/2017\/08\/tempo-tactics-5-3-2-ciros-croatia-part-2-russia-2018\/","title":{"rendered":"Tempo Tactics: 5-3-2 \u0106iro\u2019s Croatia Part 2 Russia 2018"},"content":{"rendered":"
Welcome back to part two of my reinvention of the golden generation of Croatia circa 1996-98. In part one, Davor \u0160uker took over the Croatian national team and successfully applied Ciro Blazevic\u2019s 5-3-2 to secure qualification to World Cup 2018 in Russia as Group winners. In this part, we look at how the World Cup Finals tournament goes and identify the pretenders to the crown that were once worn so magnificently by Boban, Bilic, Prosine\u010dki and \u0160uker himself.<\/p>\n
What is success? In our case, I am aiming to get Croatia back to the Golden Generation\u2019s level so the objective is better than 3rd at a World Cup. But would less than this be a failure? Let\u2019s look at Croatia\u2019s recent international competition record:<\/p>\n
1996 European Championship<\/td>\n | Quarter Final<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
1998 World Cup<\/td>\n | 3rd Place<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
2000 Euros<\/td>\n | Did Not Qualify<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
2002 WC<\/td>\n | Group Stage<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
2004 Euros<\/td>\n | Group Stage<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
2006 WC<\/td>\n | Group Stage<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
2008 Euros<\/td>\n | Quarter Final<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
2010 WC<\/td>\n | Did not Qualify<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
2012 Euros<\/td>\n | Group Stage<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
2014 WC<\/td>\n | Group Stage<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
2016 Euros<\/td>\n | Round of 16<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
2018 WC<\/td>\n | ??????<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n <\/p>\n As World Cups go, if we get out of the group we can call that an improvement. The top two go through from the 8 groups as was the case in Brazil 2014 where 4 points were enough for many teams to qualify in 2nd place. Two wins should do the trick but a lot depends on the draw.<\/p>\n |