Croatia advanced to the FIFA World Cup quarte-finals after overcoming Japan on penalties at the Al Janoub Stadium on Monday evening.
2022 FIFA World Cup
Result: Japan 1-1 Croatia (Croatia won 3-1 on penalties)
Date: 05 December 2022
Venue: Al Janoub Stadium
The Samurai Blue made three changes from the win over Spain, as Takehiro Tomiyasu, Wataru Endo, and Ritsu Doan while Croatia recalled Bruno Petkovic and Borna Barisic.
Japan should have been ahead as early as the third minute, but defender Shogo Taniguchi steered his header wide of the upright from six-yards out.
The Croatians recovered from the slow start and were gifted a chance to open the scoring on 10 minutes when Tomiyasu's error sent Ivan Perisic clear on goal, but the winger was unable to beat goalkeeper Shuichi Gonda.
The tempo surprisingly died down as the first half went on, with Croatia unable to do much in the final third despite dominating possession for large parts of the encounter.
The lack of possession did not seem to affect Japan, who went on to break the deadlock on the stroke of halftime as Maya Yoshida nodded the ball back into the danger area, where Daizen Maeda was on hand to fire home.
Croatia, however got back on level terms ten minutes after the halftime break as Perisic found the back of the net with a superb header from Dejan Lovren's cross, taking his tally to six World Cup goals overall.
Japan responded with a double change after the hour mark, as Maeda and Nagatomo made way for Kaoru Mitoma and Takuma Asano Asano while Ante Budimir came on for the Croatians in place of Bruno Petkovic.
The European nation had a chance to pull ahead in the 66th minute, as Budimir nearly made an immediate impact by picking out Andrej Kramaric who steered his header wide of the target from close range.
Both sides went back and fourth pushing for a winning goal in the latter stages of the second half, however neither were able to carve out any serious openings and were forced to play another 30 minutes of extra-time.
Japan were the only side to register a serious effort at goal in extra-time, with Mitoma unleashing a powerful strike from the edge of the box that goalkeeper Dominik Livakovic managed to parry away.
The game was to be decided by a penalty shoot-out, where Croatia dominated after Livakovic made three saves as side triumphed 3-1 in the shoot-out to advance to the quarter-finals.
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