Croatia squad for crucial Scotland and Portugal matches announced

Croatia celebrates

The Croatian national team coach, Zlatko Dalić, has named a squad of 25 players, with six additional standby players, for Croatia’s UEFA Nations League matches against Scotland and Portugal.

Croatia will first take on Scotland on 15th November in Glasgow before meeting Portugal on 18th November at Poljud stadium in Split.

After four rounds, Croatia currently holds second place in the group with seven points, trailing Portugal (10 points) but ahead of Poland (4 points) and Scotland (1 point).

The top two teams advance to the quarter-finals, while the third-placed team will enter playoffs to retain their League A status. The last-placed team will be relegated to League B.

Dalić has largely stuck with the squad he’s relied on throughout the autumn, including four goalkeepers, while awaiting the Disciplinary Committee’s decision on a potential additional suspension for Dominik Livaković, who received a red card against Poland, resulting in an automatic one-match ban.

“A few players are currently recovering from injuries, so we’ll closely monitor the situation over the next two weeks and adjust the squad as necessary,” Dalić noted. “We intentionally avoided adding any more U-21 players to this squad, except for those who have been with us all autumn, to ensure the U-21 team is in the best possible shape for their crucial matches against Georgia.”

“We’ve set ourselves up well for this final gathering of the year, and now it’s time to capitalise on that and achieve our goal of reaching the quarter-finals,” Dalić added.

“Our full focus is on the Scotland match, where we can secure our advancement. After that, we’ll turn our attention to Portugal and the match in Split, where a full Poljud Stadium promises an exciting spectacle.”

The squad will assemble on Monday, 11th November, in Zagreb, where they will train until 14th November before travelling to Glasgow. The day after the match in Scotland, the team will head to Split to face Portugal on 18th November.

Croatia enters this Nations League round as the defending silver medallists.

Squad for the matches against Scotland and Portugal:

Goalkeepers: Dominik Livaković, Ivica Ivušić, Nediljko Labrović, Dominik Kotarski

Defenders: Joško Gvardiol, Duje Ćaleta-Car, Borna Sosa, Josip Šutalo, Kristijan Jakić

Midfielders: Luka Modrić, Mateo Kovačić, Mario Pašalić, Nikola Vlašić, Luka Sučić, Martin Baturina, Petar Sučić, Nikola Moro

Forwards: Ivan Perišić, Andrej Kramarić, Bruno Petković, Ante Budimir, Mislav Oršić, Marko Pjaca, Marco Pašalić, Igor Matanović

Standby players: Lovro Majer, Luka Ivanušec, Marin Pongračić, Martin Erlić, Šimun Hrgović, Toni Fruk