Indestructible Ivan Rakitic Sets World Record

by croatiaweek
July 13, 2018
in Sport

Ivan Rakitic (Twitter/FIFA)

Rakitic and Brozovic set records.

When the full-time whistle blew after 124 minutes in Moscow on Wednesday night Croatian midfielder Ivan Rakitic sprinted to celebrate with energy like the match had just kicked-off.

The indestuctible Barcelona star, who had the captain’s armband on at the end of the match after Luka Modric came off, set a world record at the Luzhniki Stadium when he played his 70th match of the season.

Rakitic (HNS)

No other player in the world has played as many matches this season.

Rakitic has played 55 times for Barcelona this season and has made 15 appearances for Croatia.

Croatia coach Zlatko Dalic revealed that Rakitic had a high temperature the night before the England semi-final, but there is no chance of him missing Sunday’s final.

“No chance. I will play on one leg if I have to,” Rakitic said as 24sata writes.

The match against France will be his 71st this season and his 99th for Croatia.

Rakitic has been one of Croatia’s heroes this tournament. A goal against Argentina and back-to-back final penalties against Russia and Denmark makes him one of the candidates for the Golden Boot award with Modric.

Meanwhile, Marcelo Brozovic set a World Cup record against England for the most running in a match. The Inter Milan midfielder ran an incredible 16.339 kilometres during the match, passing the current record set by Russia’s Aleksandr Golovin of just under 15 kilometres.