The game started with Croatia dominating the possession and the match as they were trying to find a goal to kick start hopefully another successful world cup campaign and they almost just did that as in the seventeenth minute they had the first key chance of the game as Perisic hits his chance just over the bar. Then after that their opponents went straight down the pitch as Ziyech whipped in a teasing cross, but En-Nesyri read it wrong and didn’t make good contact with it.
Croatia were dominating the game and almost came close to a goal just before half time as Bounou made a good save from Vlasic who thought he opened his account for his side at the world cup. Then another chance came for the Croatian side as Modric hits his shot over the bar from the Perisic cross it was looking likely that they were going to score in a matter of time.
Second half and the Moroccan side started off better as they almost took a shock lead as Livakovic denied Mazraoui’s near post header as Morocco were trying to find a goal to take the match in their favour and a few minutes later they almost did that as Ziyech rolled the ball into Hakimi who hit a powerful shot, but Livakovic managed to punch it away in the air. In the end it was a 0-0 draw with both teams barely creating any good chances and it was a deserved result in the end.
Man of the Match: Naif Aguerd
It was a good performance from the West Ham centre back as he managed to keep out the world cup runner ups and he did well with sticking to his task as he won all his duals and made so many clearances and recoveries which helped his side keep a clean sheet against the world cup runner ups which was key for his side today.
Flop of the match: Nikola Vlasic
It wasn’t a great game for the Croatian attacker as he failed to do anything in the 45 minutes he got, and he missed a big chance which was costly today as the game ended 0-0 and that chance would’ve made a big difference if he took it and he only managed to win one ground dual in his cameo he had which is not good enough for someone like him and he will have to do better to give him and his side a chance of doing well at this tournament.
The game was quite even, and it came to no surprise it ended as a draw as both teams amassed one shot on goal which is terrible for both sides especially in a world cup game. Croatia did dominate possession, but they couldn’t do anything with it as it was a terrible performance from both sides and both of them will hopefully want to improve on that terrible performance.
Luke's Football blog 