Daily Times

SOCHI: Ivan Rakitic is hoping this Croatia team can go a step further after matching the country’s heroes of 1998 by making it to the semi-finals of the World Cup. Barcelona midfielder Rakitic scored the decisive spot-kick as Croatia beat Russia 4-3 on penalties on Saturday. “We worked so hard and gave everything we had to get through to the semis. I think for a country like Croatia it is impressive and we want to keep going further,” said Rakitic. “We want to enjoy this victory and not put more pressure on ourselves with what happened in 1998 – what they did was impressive but we want to keep writing our own history.” Croatia will play England in the last four in Moscow on Wednesday.

Published in Daily Times, July 9^th 2018.