Panama 0-1 Croatia: Modric celebrates 200th cap with win as Canaleros bow out of World Cup | OneFootball

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Luka Modric celebrated his 200th international cap in style as Croatia narrowly beat Panama 1-0 to eliminate their opponents from the World Cup at the Toronto Stadium.

Los Canaleros were the more dangerous side before half time, forcing Dominik Livakovic into an acrobatic save to tip a header from José Rodríguez onto the crossbar as the previous semi-finalists appeared short of ideas to find the net.

But Croatia sprang into life after the restart as substitute Ante Budemir tapped in a low ball across goal, edging a very close contest to rise to third in Group L and send their opponents home on their second appearance on the world stage.

As it happened

The contest didn’t get going until Cristian Martínez was released down the right hand side with 20 minutes gone, and saw his shot from a very tight angle comfortably saved by Dominik Livakovic.

Modric had given Ivan Perisic a sight of goal with a beautifully floated pass over Panama’s defence, but the 37-year-old winger wasn’t able to properly test the goalkeeper in a moment that summed up a drab first half from the former semi-finalists.

Rodríguez gave Croatia a scare with the best chance of the first half, forcing Livakovic into tipping his header onto the crossbar after neat build up play down the right wing between Martínez and right wing-back Amir Murillo.

The ball was judged to have crossed the byline before Murillo’s delivery, meaning that Panama ended the first half with just the one effort on goal but were by far the more dangerous out of the two sides.

Croatia’s brightest young outlet who came closest to a goal, despite being the most experienced squads in terms of total caps, when attacking midfielder Martin Baturina’s low drive pushed around the post by Orlando Mosquera in first-half stoppage time.

One of the two half-time changes by Zlatko Dalić quickly paid off as Budimir tapped an accurate cross from Josep Stanisic into the net for his seventh goal in 39 caps, following a lovely backheel by Marco Pasilic to set the Bayern Munich right-back away.

Pasilic could’ve doubled Croatia’s lead after he was released through the middle by Modric to catch Panama short at the back following a corner and had the whole half to himself.

His attempted lob was smothered by Mosquera and fortuitously rebounded back into his path, yet the 25-year-old skied it on the follow up to the left of goal and left the Croatian supporters in disbelief behind the net.

Livokavic was determined to hold out for the clean sheet after his heroics restricted England to just the four goals last time out, twice parrying powerful efforts from Murillo and then keeping out Harvey’s header from the resulting corner.

Murillo had the opportunity to extend Croatia’s wait for a win at the 2026 World Cup in added time, but curled the free kick well wide of the target as Modric saw his team hold on to claim an important victory on a special day for the iconic 40-year-old.

Croatia will face Ghana hoping to get at least a draw in a shootout for automatic qualification into the round of 32 on Saturday.

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Panama – Croatia Live Score