The masters of their time – Newspaper Kommersant No. 230 (7431) dated 12/10/2022

The very first quarter-final of the World Cup in Qatar graced it with another sensation. The Brazilian national team, which already began to look like the main favorite of the tournament, could not reach the semi-finals, stumbling upon an amazing Croatian team, once again proving that they can survive better than anyone else. Having withstood Brazilian pressure in regular time, surviving Neymar’s goal already in overtime, the Croats endured until the penalty shootout, and in it they ruthlessly killed the Brazilian dream of a sixth league title.

Tears of the Brazilian players after this match were caught by all TV cameras with pleasure. Tears of such despair that it is difficult to imagine. It was four years ago in Russia that Brazil’s loss in the quarter-finals of the world championship was perceived as something quite expected, given its own problems and the brilliance emanating from the Belgians who defeated it. In Qatar, the circumstances were very different.

By the quarterfinals, the Brazilian team, having regained the style and power of the best times, has become, from the point of view of experts, bookmakers, and ordinary fans, the undisputed leader among contenders for gold.

But she was nevertheless stopped a couple of steps away from him by the most, apparently, the strangest team in world football – a team that does not care about quotes, about how the match is going. In 2018, not very highly rated, the Croats reached the final of the World Cup, on the way to it, defeating rivals – Danes, Russians and the British – three times in a row in meetings that climbed outside the regular time. In Qatar, in the 1/8 finals, they continued the trend, winning in a penalty shootout against the Japanese, who looked very cool against their background for some time. And now we have replenished the collection of scalps with such a more valuable one than you can imagine, in a match that shook the level of intrigue.

There was some very special football going on at the Education City stadium. Football, which, of course, could be called boring due to the lack of sharp events, but which, in fact, with outward discreetness, was filled to the brim with all sorts of curious things that turn the match into a viscous, but nonetheless exciting detective story.

And the one who tried to determine where everything will turn out, had to admit from time to time that he again sat down in a puddle. At first, for example, I wanted to assume that the Croatian national team still resigned itself to the fact that it had reached its Qatari ceiling, and, shaking in the knees, were not able to resist the Brazilians on an equal footing. The flank defenders do not cross the center line at all, timidly sitting in the trenches, although their activity seemed to be a good way to extinguish the activity of the Brazilian edges. The pressure is on, but somehow awkward. This should be recorded on training videos in order to demonstrate how it is not necessary to put pressure, because simply resorting to someone else’s penalty area to stand close to rivals without trying to take the ball away is a meaningless and even harmful occupation: forces are not a lot. And after that, you need to include – as a positive example – a video with the pressure of the Russian team from 2018: this is how you need to choke. The very first noticeable action of Luka Modric, who, in theory, as the leader, as the core of the team, had to convey confidence in the future to his partners with every step, is a terrible, out of the blue sawn-off shotgun in the center of the field, which went to Rafinha and spoke rather about the fact that and Modric succumbed to the jitters that he also understands who is the favorite here and who is the weakling.

But after a quarter of an hour after that, I wanted to believe that the Croats thus deftly lured the Brazilian team into a trap and that they were better prepared for the quarterfinals.

Formally, the Brazilians still had the ball more often, but all the beauty and effectiveness of their game completely disappeared on the outskirts of the opponents’ defensive squad led by Yoshko Guardiol. But every second attack by the Croats increased the degree of tension near the Brazilian penalty area and even inside it – well, not to the limit, but quite high. And if the Brazilian team had only potential moments, then the Croatian team – for example, Ivan Perisic – are quite real. And the Croatian flanks eventually turned on. And Josip Yuranovich, almost breaking through to the Brazilian gates, “put” Danila on a warning. And the degree of rudeness of his foul, for which a stricter referee than Michael Oliver could have given a red card instead of a yellow one, suggested that the favorites were also playing tricks on their nerves.

But towards the end of the first half, the Brazilian national team looked prettier, more powerful again. She was still tormented, trying to overcome the last frontier of the Croatian defense, but at least Neymar, Richarlison, Vinicius were already in front of him all the time, all the time knocking on the tight – tighter than in all their previous Qatari matches – the closed door so far.

And after the break, the knocking became louder and louder. And the state of the Croatian rear was sometimes drawn to describe with the word “panic”. No, probably, it was still too strong, but there really were episodes of some kind of absolute confusion among the Croats.

And Neymar once suddenly found himself opposite the goalkeeper Dominik Livakovic, literally five meters from the gate.

But the Croatian national team has once again demonstrated that it is an insanely specific team, that the same approach that is true in relation to, say, the Serbians, Swiss, Koreans beaten by the Brazilians on the way to the quarterfinals, is completely inapplicable to it. He has long been accustomed to exist in survival mode. Yes, you can say that she loves to exist in this mode – when you are always on the ground, when you get out all the time.

And, of course, Livakovich was a living symbol of this specificity. He held his own against Neymar, and against who later found himself in a position no worse than Lucas Paqueta, and again against Neymar, whom two other Brazilians who dyed their hair blond – Richarlison and Rodrigue – brought to the goal, it seems, perfectly, so that it was not possible to score difficult. And most importantly, after these exploits, Livakovich returned to the “ribbon” with the air of a man who had just done a pleasant warm-up, almost smiling. For him, these were work situations that could not be avoided, that’s okay. And in vain, BBC analysts praised in every way sophistication and variety – pockets of threats with the same frequency appear on the right, left and in the center – Brazilian attacks, to which the replacements of coach Tite only added fire. Sophistication, variety, fire did not matter here. The Croatian team still got to their favorite overtime.

This team, sucking like a giant vacuum cleaner, out of opponents just bursting with life, pulled out a solid portion of it from the Brazilians. In extra time, they weren’t like a team that plays football while dancing.

On the contrary, it looked like a suffering team. And once I almost ran into trouble when Bruno Petkovic, having fooled two defenders at once, rolled the ball to Marcelo Brozovic under a lethal blow in the future. But Brozovich did not grow together with him. And after that, the Brazilian football player took the floor, in which, as it turned out, there was still plenty of life, despite the recent injury, despite the fact that an exhausting one and a half hour marathon was left behind.

Neymar has scored hundreds of goals in his professional career. But sweeter than this, at the end of the first of the two added fifteen-minute halves, it is possible that it has never been. When there was already a feeling that the Brazilians had finally exhausted their energy reserves, that they could not wait for an explosion, their leader finally gave out the trick that neither Guardiol nor Livakovic could figure out. A seemingly simple trick, but too clear, actually flawlessly executed: a “wall” with Lucas Paqueta, a dash and two steps away from the goalkeeper, opening the corner wide open. The Brazilian bench still began to dance.

But there was another fifteen-minute half ahead. And the Brazilians saw it off, making it clear that they intend to keep the extracted stock, and not try to increase it. And it was a bad idea, because with rivals like the Croats, rivals with a big heart who never give up, grasping a positive result with both hands is like death.

The thesis quickly received confirmation more convincing than ever. The Croatian attack was dispersed, of course, by Luka Modric, and continued by three players who came on as a substitute – Nikola Vlašić, Mislav Oršić and Bruno Petković, who crowned it with a blow. Brazilian goalkeeper Alisson, slightly disoriented by the ricochet, did not cope with it. So everything turned to a penalty shootout. In it, Livakovich took the first Brazilian penalty kick – from Rodrigo. And his partners – Vlasic, Lovro Mayer, Modric, Orsic – beat their own as if they didn’t feel any pressure, as if they didn’t go to a shootout with a fatal outcome for someone, but to an ordinary training session. It was they who felt themselves the undisputed masters of the situation, and not the unfortunate Brazilians, whose dream of a sixth league title was killed cynically and cruelly.

It was all over when Marquinhos slammed the ball into the post. The tear-stained Brazilians went home, the Croats, like four years ago, to hunt for World Cup medals.

In the semi-final they will face the winner of the late evening Moscow time match between the national teams of Argentina and the Netherlands.

Alexey Dospekhov