It is the Croatia soccer team (Croatian Hrvatska nogometna repertorija) is the representative of Croatia in international football matches for males. matches . It is governed by the Croatian Football Federation (HNS). The team was recognized by both FIFA as well as UEFA following the dissolution Yugoslavia. There was a lot of activity during the period of political instability representing sovereign entities, such as those of the Banovina of Croatia from 1939 up to 1941 as well as The Independent State of Croatia from 1941 until 1944.
The current team has been playing games in competition since 1994 beginning with the qualification campaign for UEFA Euro 1996. The year 1998 was the time they participated for the first time in the FIFA World Cup, finishing third and bringing the tournament's top scorer, Davor Suker. Twenty years after, Croatia reached the 2018 World Cup Final, providing the tournament's top player, Luka Modric. Croatia is among the youngest national teams (since their inception) to make it to the knockout phase of a major tournament , as in addition to being the youngest team to make it to the top 10 positions in the FIFA World Ranking.
In addition to other nicknames, the team is called The Vatreni (Blazers) as well as The Kockasti (The Checkered Ones). In the Italian-speaking countries, the team is called Il Furioso Incendio (The Flaring Fire). Since becoming eligible for competition, Croatia has only failed to make it to two major tournaments: UEFA Euro 2000 and the 2010 FIFA World Cup. Their most infamous loss was the 2018-19 Nations League with a 0-6 defeat to Spain the highest scoring win was a friendly win of 10-0 against San Marino in 2016. The team has been involved in a variety of rivalries, including their rivalry with Derby Adriatico with Italy or the political-charged rivalry with Serbia and Serbia, each of which has caused a lot of disruption in games.
Croatia is the second-tiniest country in terms of population as well as area to make it to the World Cup finals, behind Uruguay and Netherlands respectively. In major tournaments, Croatia holds joint-records for longest time between a goal and another of an individual (2002-2014) as well as the most penalty shoot-outs and the longest extra time played , and the highest number of penalties saved during a game. They're also among three teams--alongside Colombia and France--to have been named FIFA Top Mover several times and have won the award in 1998 and 1994. At the time of joining FIFA, Croatia was ranked at 125th place in the world. after in 1998's World Cup campaign, the team was able to climb to third in the rankings, which makes it the most unstable group in FIFA Ranking time.
