Croatia

Croatia arrive at the 2026 World Cup as the most decorated small nation in modern international football — second in 2018, third in 2022, and still anchored by Luka Modrić in a midfield that has been world-class since the autumn of 2017. Zlatko Dalić’s 26-man squad announced on 18 May features eight players from the 2018 final XI, the league spread across Croatian, Italian, German, Spanish, Dutch and English clubs, and a deliberately phased succession plan in midfield. The seven stand-by names — including Lovro Majer, Franjo Ivanović and Dion Drena Beljo — speak to Dalić’s caution about Modrić, Kovačić and Gvardiol all carrying recent injuries.

Group L gives Croatia a familiar opener and two new ones. England on 17 June at the Dallas Stadium is the third consecutive major-tournament cycle in which the two have met (2018 World Cup semi-final, 2022 World Cup group stage didn’t happen but Euro 2024 fixture lists were close) and Croatia have a clear psychological edge — they beat England in Moscow in extra time, and Modrić, Perišić, Brozović and Kovačić from that squad are still in the current group. Panama on 23 June in Toronto is a first-ever meeting and a fixture Croatia will expect to control through midfield. Ghana on 27 June in Philadelphia closes the group and could be everything or nothing depending on the first two results. Realistically, Croatia should reach the round of 16, where the bracket likely delivers either Mexico, Switzerland, or the USA — all winnable for a team that knows how to manage 90 minutes.

The ceiling is a third consecutive deep run, which would be the most extraordinary achievement in international football for any nation outside the top-five population brackets. The floor is a chastening group-stage exit driven by Modrić unavailability and the cumulative impact of ageing legs — and given the injury list, the floor is more realistic now than it has been at any point in Dalić’s tenure. The most likely scenario is the same one Croatia have produced in 2018 and 2022: midfield dominance, a couple of late goals, an extra-time grind, and a quarter-final or semi-final exit that gets received at home as either heartbreaking or heroic depending on who beats them. Either way, this is the closing chapter — the federation, Dalić, and Modrić have all hinted as much — and there is one more medal to chase before the curtain falls.

Croatia’s 2026 World Cup squad is, on its face, the same project that finished second in 2018 and third in 2022 — only older, banged-up, and visibly transitioning. Luka Modrić, 40, is captaining his fifth World Cup, joining a tiny pantheon (Carbajal, Matthäus, Buffon, Messi, Ronaldo) of men to do so. He arrives 196 caps deep, with a cheekbone fracture from April 2026 healed and a free move from Real Madrid to AC Milan logged last summer. The federation announced the 26 players on 18 May from Zagreb, with seven stand-by names retained — a normal Dalić move, but one made more pointed this year by the fitness concerns surrounding Modrić, Mateo Kovačić (Achilles trouble for much of 2025-26 at Manchester City) and Joško Gvardiol (recovering from a fractured tibia).

Tactically, Dalić has not changed his identity since the day he was appointed in October 2017. Croatia play a midfield-heavy 4-3-3 that prioritises possession, slow tempo, and a small handful of seismic vertical balls per game — a tournament style perfectly designed to control 90 minutes and survive into extra time, which is exactly what carried them past Denmark, Russia and England in 2018 and Japan and Brazil in 2022. The succession plan is visible: Petar Sučić (22, Inter), Martin Baturina (23, Como), and Luka Sučić (23, Real Sociedad) are now genuine alternatives to the Modrić-Kovačić-Pašalić trio, not just understudies. The depth in midfield is, as always, Croatia’s strategic comparative advantage against bigger, more individually talented nations.

The pressure points are at both ends of the pitch. Up top, Croatia have never had a dominant centre-forward in the modern era — Kramarić, Budimir and Petar Musa are competent professionals, none of them world-class — which forces the goals through Perišić (still scoring at 37) and the midfielders’ late runs. At the back, Croatia’s first-choice line of Stanišić, Gvardiol, Šutalo and Ćaleta-Car is solid but slow; Luka Vušković, the 19-year-old Hamburg loanee owned by Tottenham, is the long-term solution but unlikely to start the opener.

The brackets are kind. Croatia open against England on 17 June at the Dallas Stadium — a rematch of the 2018 semi-final that Croatia won in extra time — followed by Panama (a first-ever meeting) and Ghana on 27 June in Philadelphia. The realistic ceiling here is what it has been for nearly a decade: another deep knockout run powered by midfield control, set-piece resilience and one or two clutch Perišić goals. The floor — given the injury list and Modrić’s age — is a chastening group exit that would close the door on the most successful national team era any small footballing country has ever assembled. The most likely outcome sits in between: second in the group, a winnable round-of-16 tie, and a final medal that nobody outside Croatia thought possible when Dalić took the job.

Zlatko Dalić is the most successful head coach in Croatian football history and one of the most quietly accomplished international managers of the past decade. Born in October 1966 in Livno (then Yugoslavia, now Bosnia and Herzegovina), Dalić had a workmanlike playing career — Hajduk Split, Velež Mostar, Varteks — before moving into coaching in 2005 with Croatian First League side Varteks. His early club career was modest: he was sacked at Rijeka in 2008 after an Intertoto Cup elimination, then bounced through Saudi sides Al-Faisaly and Al-Hilal before finding his level at Al-Ain in the UAE, where he won the league title in 2014-15 and reached the AFC Champions League final in 2016. He left Al-Ain in January 2017 citing a need for rest. Nine months later, the Croatian Football Federation handed him the national team after sacking Ante Čačić.

The transformation was immediate and historic. Within eight months of taking the job, Dalić had Croatia in a World Cup final — beating Argentina in the group stage, then surviving extra time against Denmark, Russia and England in the knockouts before losing 4-2 to France in Moscow. The 2022 World Cup ran a similar script: a quarter-final shootout victory over Brazil, a semi-final loss to Argentina, a third-place playoff win over Morocco. Two consecutive World Cup medals for a country of fewer than four million people remains one of the most remarkable achievements in modern international football, and the credit Dalić receives at home reflects it: he is the only Croatia manager regarded as on a level with Miroslav “Ćiro” Blažević, the architect of the 1998 third-place run.

Tactically, Dalić’s identity has been consistent throughout his tenure: a 4-3-3 that prioritises midfield control, slow possession, and survival into extra time. He has rarely changed shape or personnel mid-tournament. His relationship with Luka Modrić is the central management story of his career — Dalić has trusted Modrić far past the age at which most international captains step aside, and Modrić has repaid that trust by extending his international career into his 41st year. The current squad’s midfield succession (Petar Sučić, Luka Sučić, Baturina) is being introduced gradually, in fixtures where Modrić can be rested rather than replaced.

Dalić signed a new contract through the 2026 World Cup after the 2022 bronze, and the 2026 tournament is widely expected to be the closing chapter of both his and Modrić’s international careers. His pre-tournament messaging — including the announcement of seven stand-by players alongside the 26 named on 18 May — has been notably calm, even fatalistic. The squad’s injury list (Modrić’s cheekbone, Kovačić’s Achilles, Gvardiol’s tibia) gives him cover for any underwhelming result; the historical capital he has accumulated gives him the freedom to chase a third medal without losing his job if he falls short. The realistic expectation is another quarter-final or better. The romantic expectation is that the manager who built the Modrić era gets to escort it off the stage with one final, perhaps unlikely, deep run.