Croatia vs Spain was billed as one of the most intriguing ties of the knockout rounds, and it did not disappoint, as we were treated to some fast, frenetic and unbelievable moments in this EURO 2020 match in Copenhagen. Spain eventually won 5-3 in extra-time, but that was after Croatia had fought back heroically from 3-1 down to level the score at 3-3 in the last few minutes of stoppage time, and that too came after Croatia had taken the lead in this match via a bizarre own goal. Spain made one change to the side that beat Slovakia 5-0, with Ferran Torres starting instead of Gerard Moreno, while Croatia had two enforced absences, with Ante Rebic and Duje Caleta-Car coming in for Ivan Perisic and Dejan Lovren respectively. The match had just begun to bubble with intensity when Croatia took the lead in unbelievable circumstances – Pedri played a pass back to his goalkeeper, Unai Simon, from the halfway line, and the keeper took his eye off the ball and allowed it to run under his foot and into the net. Spain began to push forward to find an equalizer, with Koke and Alvaro Morata missing great chances, before Pablo Sarabia equalized just before half time. Spain started the second half on the front foot as well, and Cesar Azpilicueta’s first international goal put them ahead of Croatia in the 57th minute. When Ferran Torres scored Spain’s third 20 minutes later, it seemed as though the game was up for Croatia. However, Zlatko Dalic made a number of attacking substitutions, which paid off magically. First, Mislav Orsic bundled the ball over the line in the 85th minute to give Croatia some hope, and then in the second minute of added time, fellow substitute Mario Pasalic headed in a brilliant cross from Orsic to spark pandemonium among the Croatian fans and disbelief among the Spaniards. Orsic had a wonderful chance to give Croatia the lead early into extra-time, but Simon made an unbelievable save to keep things level, following which Morata scored with a fantastic volley to put Spain ahead. Mikel Oyarzabal applied the icing on the cake a few minutes later, and Spain are now belatedly through to the quarter-finals, where they will face Switzerland, who came through an epic of their own against France. Check out our EURO 2020 analytics report from this match for the key data, statistics and visualisations.
