France have won the 2018 FIFA World Cup after beating Croatia 4-2.
The two sides both set up cautiously, with France opting to play Blaise Matuidi on the left to deal with the threat posed by Rebić, Modrić and Vrsaljko down Croatia’s right, and Zlatko Dalić opting to play Marcelo Brozović as a holding midfielder.
Fatigue was clearly no issue for Croatia as they dominated the opening stages and looked the sharper team, despite playing 120 minutes in all three previous knockout games, two of which went to penalties.
But it was France who broke the deadlock in the 18th minute, as an inswinging free-kick from Antoine Griezmann took a slight deflection off Mario Mandžukić, to take it past Danijel Subašić.
But Perisic’s heroics were undone ten minutes later when the ball struck his arm in the box and referee Nestor Pitana awarded a penalty after observing the incident for what felt like an age on the touchline monitor.
It was the first time we’d seen VAR for several games, yet it only further highlighted its flaws when making decisions on contentious handballs.
Croatia began the second half on the front foot, refusing to be disheartened by the controversial decision in the first half. But once again they were sucker-punched by France on the counter, as Kylian Mbappe broke in behind, played the ball inside to Griezmann, who laid it off to Pogba, who slotted the ball past Subašić with his left foot at the second time of asking.
Chaos followed as France extended their lead to 4-1 before a Hugo Lloris clanger let Mandzukic reduce the lead to two.
