After a suspenseful match concluded 0-0 during extra time, Spain won the Nations League on Sunday thanks to a 5-4 victory against Croatia in a shootout.
Dani Carvajal won the championship for Spain with a Panenka penalty that he tucked home to win the game.
Carvajal’s cheeky chipped goal was enough to give Spain their first title since the Euro 2012 tournament and shatter the hearts of the Croatians. Spain’s goalkeeper Unai Simon stopped Lovro Mayer and Bruno Petkovic from scoring from the penalty spot.
The team coached by Zlatko Dalic finished in second place at the World Cup in 2018 and in third place at the World Cup in 2022. However, they have never won a major prize, and they were anticipating that Luka Modric’s achievement in the Nations League would be the highlight of his illustrious international career.
After receiving a great deal of criticism in March after a loss to Scotland in qualifying for Euro 2024, new Spain coach Luis de la Fuente received a confidence boost as a result of this victory. Additionally, it avenged their loss to France in the final match in 2021.
“For us it was a unique opportunity, we went out early in another tournament (at the World Cup in Qatar), and today we had to take advantage,” Carvajal, a defender for Real Madrid, said in an interview with the Spanish broadcasting company TVE.
“We had confidence in the penalties, and they went really well; I knew how I was going to shoot it, and I knew that I was going to be sixth… I wanted to finish it off in a Panenka fashion, and it worked well.”
The bulk of the stadium, De Kuip, was covered in a sea of red and white checkered squares, with just a small section reserved for Spanish supporters. Dalic had warned that more than 25,000 Croatian supporters were anticipated to come to Rotterdam for the match.
In the tenth minute, the Croatian crowd began chanting Luka Modric’s name in unison with the number 10 on his jersey in an effort to convince him not to hang up his international boots at the end of the tournament, as had been widely speculated.
On the field, Spain got off to a quick start, with Gavi attempting a shot that went just wide of the goal as Spain pressed really hard to gain the ball back.
Under the pink shroud of smoke from the Croatian flares, just as the game was about to go into a small lull, Josip Juranovic sent a long ball over the top for Andrej Kramaric. Spain came dangerously close to being caught off guard by the pass.
The striker was all alone in front of Unai Simon’s goal, but just as he was about to shoot, Aymeric Laporte produced an outstanding diving save to deny the shot.
Despite the fact that there were 14 goals scored in the three games that came before this one, the first half of this Nations League final ended scoreless, much like the first half of the last two finals, which were won by Portugal in 2019 and France in 2021 respectively.
Rigid and tense in nature
Ivan Perisic, a wide player for Tottenham who was playing at left back for Dalic’s team, was a constant danger to score, as was Jordi Alba, the captain of Spain. Dalic’s team won the match.
A hazardous cross from the former Barcelona defender reached Asensio, and the striker redirected it onto the top of the goal. During the first eighty minutes of play, La Roja did not manage to get a single shot on goal.
At the other end, Mario Pasalic had a header go wide before being replaced by Petkovic, who went on to be the hero of Croatia’s semi-final match against the Netherlands. In fact, one Croatian publication referred to Petkovic as “Bruce Willis in football boots” because of his performance. This time around, that did not prove to be the case.
In response, Spain brought on their own potential semi-final game-winner in the form of Joselu, who replaced Morata, while Ansu Fati also joined the action.
During the whole match for both teams, it was the youthful striker for Barcelona who came the closest to scoring, but the attentive Perisic was able to clear his low effort off the line.
After a collision between Nacho and Borna Sosa, the Croatian team argued unsuccessfully for a penalty kick, and Spain’s replacement Dani Olmo, who had previously played for Dinamo Zagreb for six years, missed the target as extra time proceeded in the same tight pattern.
Because there was no clear winner between the two teams, the match was decided by a round of penalty kicks.
After Simon’s intervention, the opportunity to win was presented to Aymeric Laporte, who, however, missed the target.
Athletic Bilao’s defensive player In order to prevent Petkovic from scoring and pave the way for Carvajal to start the Spanish celebrations, Simon threw himself to his right at full stretch and made a stop.
“We’re so happy, it was a really tough game, and this is so difficult to do,” said Manchester City’s Champions League final striker Rodri, who was also named man of the match.
“There is a great deal of potential in this generation. Mentally, we were in really good shape. There are areas in which we may make improvements; but, winning is always a positive thing, and we should rejoice.