PV Sports Desk : Croatia will be hard nut to crack for France when European Power house of football meets the tiny nation meets in the final of FIFA World Cup 2018 at Luzhniki Stadium Moscow.
France won world cup once in the past in 1998, Croatia reached the final for the first time.
Croatia reached its first World Cup final with a 2-1 extra-time win over England on Thursday morning (AEST), a day after Les Bleus beat Belgium 1-0.
A victory in the final for Croatia known for its red-and-white chequered jerseys would be the nation’s greatest sporting moment since breaking from Yugoslavia to become an independent state in 1991 — a year after its national soccer team started playing.
France is a European football powerhouse. The team is able drawing from a population of about 65 million. Croatia has just over four million people, the fourth- smallest of the 32 World Cup teams ahead of Panama, Uruguay and Iceland. It has a chance to be the least-populous nation to win since Uruguay took the title in 1950, when it was a nation of just over two million.
Croatia reached the semi final stage for the only other time in 1998 when it appeared on the world cup stage of football for the first time. They ultimately lost to Germany. This time grouped with Argentina, Croatia rocked the soccer world upsetting Argentina 3-0. They entered the group of 16 topping the group which also had Iceland and Nigeria. They got across Denmark in the group of 16 match and host Russia in the quarter final through penalty shoot out.
On the other hand one of the pre tournament favourites France had relatively quiet passage from group C have Australia, Peru and Denmark. They started demonstrating their prowess from the pre quarter final when they knocked out Messi inspired Argentina. France also sent another South American giant back home getting better of them in the quarter final for a great semi final with another in form team Belgium in the semi final.
