Player ratings as Kramaric helps overturn historic Davies goal

Croatia recovered from an early setback to beat Canada 4-1 in a key Group F clash on Sunday evening.

After a promising, but ultimately fruitless showing against Belgium in their first World Cup match since 1986, Canada came into this clash full of confidence. It showed very quickly too, with Alphonso Davies tearing into the box to head home Tajon Buchanan’s excellent cross – thus becoming the first Canadian male to ever score at a World Cup.

Playing in a bold 4-2-4 system, the CanMNT kept their foot on the gas and for a good 10 minutes, had the Croatians purely on the back foot.

However, experience took over and the more Luka Modric, Mateo Kovacic and Co got on the ball, the further back Canada were pushed.

Croatia were rewarded in the 36th minute when Andrej Kramaric – having already seen one goal disallowed – got behind the Canadian defence to meet Ivan Perisic’s through ball, firing past Milan Borjan from a tight angle.

With Canada still reeling, Croatia took the lead just before half-time, with Marko Livaja sweeping an inch-perfect finish into the bottom corner from distance after a driving run from Celtic full-back Josip Juranovic.

A half-time shake-up restored some energy for Canada, but John Herdman’s men were just unable to rediscover that attacking verve that had terrified Croatia so much in the opening stages.

The 2018 World Cup runners-up finished the job on 70 minutes when Kramaric picked the ball up in the corner of the 18-yard box before cutting inside and sweeping the ball into the far corner. Insult was added to injury when Mislav Orsic and Lovro Majer punished a Kamal Miller mistake.

Sunday’s result leaves Croatia top of Group F with four points, eliminating Canada from round of 16 contention.

Here are the full player ratings from Khalifa International Stadium:

GK: Dominik Livakovic – 6/10 – Helpless on the Davies goal but made a couple of important interventions afterwards.

RB: Josip Juranovic – 7/10 – Could be accused of ball-watching on the opening goal but the speed at which Davies crashed into the box was tremendous. Did well to set up Croatia’s second.

CB: Dejan Lovren – 5/10 – Didn’t enjoy defending against that pacey Canadian attack one bit. Kept his composure on the ball, at least.

CB: Josko Gvardiol – 7/10 – Coped better than Lovren and helped Croatia get out with some driving runs through the middle.

LB: Borna Sosa – 6/10 – Struggled early on against Buchanan but got to grips…