FIFA World Cup Final 2018: France vs Croatia

I guess that it had to come to an end at some point, did it not? The FIFA World Cup 2018 in Russia will go down in the history books as one of the greatest tournaments of the modern era. Lets not pretend that there were not issues with the tournament with the standard of refereeing and the introduction of VAR combined with the lack of effective cohesive play from some of the nations. With that said the positives far outweigh the negatives, we saw goals, lots of them, and the emergence of a real star in the French forward Kylian Mbappe but more than that we saw a lot of positive football and the beginnings of the realisation of two ‘golden generations’ in Belgium and Croatia.

The final itself was a match between two deserving opponents. The French were perhaps the most consistent side over the course of the whole tournament with coach Didier Deschamps finding a way to combine resolute defence with a highly effective attacking unit, if you take out Olivier Giroud that is, whilst finding a way to unlock the full talent of the Manchester United midfielder Paul Pogba. Indeed fans of the English side may have been watching this final wondering when this version of Pogba is going to show up at Old Trafford.

Croatia on the other hand had shown real resolve to reach this stage having come through penalty shoot outs against Denmark and Russia and then going a goal down in their semi final against England before winning 2-1 with the deciding goal coming in extra time. They possessed the best player in the tournament in midfield maestro Luka Modric and a forward in Mario Mandzukic that perhaps more than any other forward belies direct comparison.

In the end, the French were a step too far for the Croatians and despite dominating large spells of the final they found the French defensive resistance difficult to penetrate.

That may have been the narrative of the final but what were the key tactical matchups?

Lineups

There were no surprises when the team news was announced with both coaches choosing to go with the same sides that came through semi-finals against Belgium and England respectively and which were now battle hardened.

The keys to the French squad lay in their defensive unit of Raphael Varane and Samuel Umtiti which was shielded superbly throughout the tournament by the brilliant N’Golo Kante. These three players existed to allow the other French players to create further forward. Paul Pogba was released by the selfless running of Kante whilst further forward Kylian Mbappe and Antoine Griezmann made penetrative runs from deeper areas that the Croatian back line struggled to deal with.