Small Nation, Big Impact: Croatia's Unforgettable World Cup Performances 

For those of you who have been following Croatia since its independence in 1992, it is a mystery and a phenomenon, but not for us Croats. 144 years have passed since the Englishmen who worked in the County during the Austro-Hungarian Empire, of which Croatia was a part, brought the first ball. Fifteen years later the first matches were already played in Zagreb. From the creation of Yugoslavia in 1918 until its disintegration in 1992, Croats have always formed the basis of every national team in all sports alongside the Serbs. Ever since the First World Cup in Uruguay in 1930, when Croats dominated the national team of the former country that shared 3rd place. At the Croats, who made up the majority of the players of the then national team, did not participate in that championship due to the boycott of the Football Association of Yugoslavia, which was moved from Zagreb to Belgrade. In those national teams of the former state, there were other nations besides the two leading ones, but in much smaller numbers.And why are we like that? Well, primarily because of heritage. Most of the quality, like before the warriors, comes from the Dinaric regions. And genetically, our people are with those Croats in BiH and the former state is more than 2/3 autochthonous, i.e. indigenous to the greatest extent from the Illyrians. To whom the newcomers Slavs brought the language and which in genetics is less in the Croats than in, for example, Albania, which is considered Illyrian because of the language, unlike us who are linguistically Slavic. Not many people know that our ancestors, the Illyrians, together with the Celts and Germans, formed a powerful Roman army. And after that, during the migration of peoples and the mixing of the indigenous Illyrians with the Slavs and other minorities, the present-day Croats were born. . and in the 17th century, with the help of Venice and Austria-Hungary, they stopped Turkey, the biggest power at the time, which had reached Vienna. All the surrounding countries were occupied, Hungary for almost 200 years, including a good part of Croatia. But the Turks came far north to Vienna, but never they crossed the line in Croatia: Križevci-Virovitica-Karlovac-Sisak. They never occupied the Dalmatian coast, but only the interior. They broke their teeth there and remained forever behind that line and later on. That warrior mentality of ours surfaced then, as it does today, in sports. And then we were in a ratio of 5:70 with the Turks, just like today in sports with bigger nations. We were simply used to dealing with the big ones as small ones for centuries. And when we were in communities like today in the EU and not in our own independent state. We say it's in our blood, although it would be more correct to say it's in our genes.

Manje nacije a vise vrhunskih igraca fudbala nema do Hrvatske. Pozdrav iz Crne Gore.

France won the 1st place in 2018, but Croatia won the hearts of football lovers all around the world. Anyone who watched it knows what happened in the finals. Regards

Small country, great nation!

I dont think we will see the end of Croatia after Modric, they have so much natural talent

As a Croatian man living in California, I was overjoyed to see us do so well in most of the World Cups we played in, 2018 and 2022 in particular. Hrvatska Zauvijek!

I'm son of a croat, and born in uruguay, so .... there

🇭🇷 and 🇺🇾 are the two small nations that pack a big punch. There is one last thing left; win the World Cup. They can do it.

We are hyper competitive. Doesn't matter what we do. I show livestock and judge both meat and livestock here in the USA and I wear a Croat flag on my meat judging hard hat, a Croat pin on my lapel at livestock judging, I wear a Croatian flag armband when I show sheep. I am part of Oklahoma Panhandle State University's agriculture program. I literally will not accept anything less than top five in all classes at all of the major livestock shows and meats/livestock judging contests. My Tata expected nothing but domination over all of my rivals. My Tata started training me at the age of five. I am 44 now. I will teach the next generation to be just as clever, astute and hungry to win.

Croatia will win the world cup is just a matter of when that is for sure.

I don't know why people think Croatia was born in the 90s, it has been a country since the 7th century, and a lot of Croatian footballers played for Yugoslavia too, and the results were pretty good.

Small nation, big ❤🇭🇷🇭🇷🇭🇷🇭🇷🇭🇷

Proud to be a Croat!🇭🇷✌️

Very well made video here with a bit of history. Croatia is an enigma in world football, there are dozens of football obsessed smaller nations all over the world but none can hope to match Croatia's qualifying and tournament record. The Croats seem to thrive on being discounted and underestimated. New subscriber, keep it up!

Croatia is the Uruguay from Europe....😊Since the 1990`s ,they are producing world high-class players.Boban,Boksic,Suker,Prosinecki,Bilic....

You can't believe, how beautiful it is to be Croatian.

as a Croat living in Japan i am proud to be Croatian and enjoyed all the world cups we had so far and new ones to come

Vezao sam se za fudbal jer je ovo mali prostor da pocnem nabrajat ostale sportove. Sjetimo se rukometa , skijanja , vatrepola , plivanja , atletike itd itd. Samo ste mi podbacili u kosarci i odbojci. Pozdrav iz Crne Gore

Gods Croatia✊️🇭🇷

Forgot to mention made the quarter finals twice in the Euro Cups 1996 and 2008, and were finalists in the Nations league 2023 silver medal

Croatia 🇭🇷 Victoria ✌️

We are football giants!

Unforgettable worldcup

I give some credit to the little man LM10. He has always been impressive

Vatreni best world cup 2018! Unbelivable! 👍⚽️⚽️🔥🔥🔥

2022 was most surprising as they were older and didn’t have a top striker anymore as Mandzukic retired. 2018 and 1998 many had Croatia as dark horses to make a deep run in the World Cup not so in 2022.

Hrvatsko srce = Hrvatsko zlato!

We have medals in every sport and we are always in top

Proud to be Croatian.

Suker legend..but let me add...Don't forget that Alen Boksic stiker/midfileder was injured, he was a legend and possibly Croatia wins with him playing, Asanovic in midfield maestro, Robert Prosinecki probably pound for pound best player in Europe at the time, Zvonimir Boban who kicked communism out of football without fear as he knew in his heart communism was wrong (we all today should have 1 percent of his courage against leftists communists we face), Jarni running up and down the flanks, 2 goals from a French defender from outside of the box, was French karma to win, but heart and souls of neutrals were for Croatia, a nation born, Godbless football and all fans...to this day, win or lose if Croatia plays i have tears of joy...

If you look at the players , they are not underdogs , only to football casuals. In 1998 you had world class players like Suker , Boban , Jarni and really good players like Soldo, Stanic , Simic,Bilic, Prosinecki .. also we missed another world class player in Alen Boksic that year .... these are players from Champions League Winners and no underdogs at all , ssme as in 2018 and 2022 with Rakitic, Modric,Perisic, Mandzukic,Brozovic even though i think the best Crostia has ever been was in 1996 if we had a Healthy Aken Boksic back than we would have been the best team in Europe

🇭🇷 thank you from the ❤️🤍💙 !!!

💪⚽️🇭🇷❤️😎

Hvala Vam...

I'm Croatian and football is not my game (don't like sports) but anyway,this is amazing. All my friends are football aficionados,so,i learned few things

Bro Croatia was not born in the nineties..

Svijet je vidio da je 2018. Francuska morala biti prvak svijeta, nepostojeći prekršaj i jako sumnjivi jedanajsterac su bili dovoljni, uz Argentinskog suca.... Argentinu neću ni komentirati jer su i sljepci sve vidjeli. Hrvatska, nažalost ali i vrlo očito, nema "ono" da bude prva.

Nice video 🇭🇷🔥💪⚽️

Proud🎉

How grandious is the NAME.OF CROATIA. OUR BUTIFUL COUNTRY. SMALL BUT VERY VERY STRONG. OUR LAND IS UNBROKEN. WE WAS STRONG DURING HISTORY. WE LOVE OUR LAND FOREVER. WE SAY ALWAYS ❤️🇭🇷 CROATIA OVERALL🇭🇷❤️CROATIA THE LAND OF TOUSEND ISLAND. WE LOVE YOU UOR BUTIFUL 🇭🇷❤CROATIA🇭🇷❤️. LONG LIVE.

nije to Mario mandzukic, vec Ivan Perisic! (6:38)

unforgetablegamee

I am from croatia

Unforgettable pilsner

Dajte mi 100000 Hrvata i osvojiti cu svijet.Napoleon Bonaparte

👍🏼

ratničko srce..ništa više..ništa manje.. mi ginemo za loptu i pobjedu od prvog razreda osnovne škole

Croatia, once have the strongest man on the Earth, and the smartest man on the Earth, the man wasAleksic andNikola Tesla

Balkan nation :) :) who is ? Croatia is Mediterranean and Central European country !

I wish you would stop saying that we are a nation born in 90s. We've been around since 7th century...

The amount of pilsners I drank during these 2 world cups only God knows

France team don't have french people in the team, enough say'n

history facts: Napoleon: "Give me 100 000 croatian soldiers and I will conqure all world"

Fact: Croatia is not an underdog basically since 1996 / 1998!

🇭🇷

Napoleon Bonaparte once said: "Give me 100000 Croats and I will conquer the whole world." We are not just great in football.... skying, handball, waterpolo... and yes, we invented a tie so we are holding a whole world by the neck.😅 and we are not born in a 90-ies....we exist a way way back

❤🤍💙

Mala nacija,ali zato borci...samo ću reći, Fifi i "velikom nogometu"nije,niti će ikad biti u interesu da Hrvat bude prvak...za to imaju "poštene"sudce na terenu...oni udaraju,sve ok,mi udaramo 11metara😂😂😂uvijek tako

Im Croatian

Croatia is not part of the Balkans

Balkans?

ZDS!

Croats are Illiryc, slavic and germanic mix. Thats why we are good in sports and wars 😁

Impact on what ?😂

I thnink Croatians are good in sports because they are Serbs.

Bog i Hrvati!!! ✌✌❤❤

If you call it Balkan, you must mention mideuropean, and mediterranian as well

Komiža, Island Vis

Croats should say at least thank you to Bosnia..without Bosnians that made bulk of Croatian teams since independence they would have been same as Serbia in Football.