Former Hajduk and current Croatian starting goalkeeper, Stipe Pletikosa, made some key saves down the stretch to give Spartak Moscow a 1-0 victory over Dinamo Zagreb at Maksimir. Dinamo wasted many chances to go ahead in the first half. In the 75th minute, Spartak went ahead on an Ivan Saenko strike which silenced the crowd of 12,000 in Zagreb.
With three points from three matches, Dinamo need at least a point in their final match at group leading Udinese on December 3rd to finish in the top 3 and qualify for the next round.
highlights
Lineups
Dinamo: Butina, Lovren, Bišćan, Drpić, Hrgović, Mikić, Vrdoljak, Badelj, Ibanez, Morales, Mandžukić
Subs: Etto, Balaban, Sammir
Manager: Marijan Vlak
Spartak: Pletikosa, Parshivlyuk, Fathi, Jiranek, Rodriguez, Pavlenko, Kovać, Kovalschuk, Saenko, Bazhenov, Prudnikov
Subs: Molyan, Zotov, Grigorev
Manager: Michael Laudrup
Referee: Thorsten Kinhöfer (Germany)
In other UEFA Cup news, Ivica Olić played the full 90 minutes and Mladen Petrić came on in the 74th minute as Hamburg fell at home 1-0 to Amsterdam. Ivica Olić once again had plenty of chances to score, but once again failed to make the scoresheet. For those of you keeping track at home, Ivica didn't manage to hit the post today.
Ivan Rakitić started for Schalke today at home to Manchester City. Ivan once again had a dull performance as he was subbed out in the 63rd minute in a 2-0 defeat.
~Denis Svirčić, reporting from Lakerville
21 comments:
Although I'm a Hajduk fan I would love to see Dinamo advance so lets hope they win the next match.
And also...I think Croatia has organised a friendly on the 11th of February against Bosnia.
Joze,
As a Hajduk fan, I would rather see Dinamo finish last. However, it would be nice to see a Croat club advance.
Croatia is in talks with Romania for a friendly in Bucharest on the 11th of February. Former Croatian manager and current Bosnian manager, Ciro Blazevic would like to face Croatia in Zagreb.
"The game would be a sellout, and the nets would be full of goals, ....in the Croatian net," ~Ciro
Bosnia is playing great football at the moment. However, I think an away friendly to Romania would be a greater test.
They are two good options considering we are playing Ukraine soon after the friendly.
Bosnia is playing some good football, I hope they advance in their qualifiers. Serbia is in a prime position to take the group easily as Romania is struggling and France is playing on the edge. Croatia should advance to the playoff if all goes well.
Marko,
There's a chance that Croatia, Serbia, Macedonia, Bosnia, Slovenia, and with a little bit of luck Montenegro all make the playoffs.
Wouldn't that be something?
5 possibly 6 Balkan teams out of 8 playoff teams.
I'll let you chew on this for a little....
ITs now confirmed they are playing Romania, in Bucharest on Feb 11th according to FIFA.com
I pray to god that if we make it we get drawn with Serbia
That would be one hell of a game, but the way Serbia are playing and the amount of quality players they have at the moment, it would be difficult to beat them
be careful what you pray for......
No kidding...I prayed that we would get England in qualifying again and it hasn't looked too good so far.
Yeah Serbia is playing amazing. They really should be undefeated, but they lost against France who are playing really terrible as of late (getting lucky draws). I do hope to see Bosnia, Croatia, and Serbia in the World Cup. As long as Bosnia/Serbia take their groups so we don't have to worry about the playoff implications. First things first, Croatia needs to take care of business against Ukraine, Belarus, and Kazakhstan...and maybe just maybe they can get some revenge on England at Wembley..although that is unlikely the form they're playing it. Still England really didn't dominate Croatia in any form in my opinion. Walcott's goal was a lucky bounce of one our defenders and once Kovac was carded the scoring barrage was warranted. One lucky bounce + red card = way behind.
Ah took a gander at Bosnia's group...I don't know if they'll be able to make it. Spain is a lock for 1st, but Turkey, Belgium, and Bosnia are all a toss-up to advance ot the playoff. Can't wait for the qualifiers to start up again.
Croatia vs Serbia in qualifiers would be even better...home in Zagreb then away in Belgrade.
The balije are playing well and I think they can beat Turkey to it. If I'm not mistaken they beat Turkey in the Euro qualifiers so theres no doubt they can do it again.
France are so over rated. Everyone was saying they could win the Euro but look where they are now. I think Greece have the easiest group.
last team i would wanna play is serbia, its like a club derby, anyone's game. There's gonna be no easy team in the draw for seceond place teams. Though id like to get revenge against the turks.
Yeah if we play Serbia or Bosnia I honestly think it'll be a toss-up so much passion from the fans, teams, it will be immense! Although I wouldn't mind :). I still rather have them advance to the World Cup group stage.
Vlad,
Yeah my father thought France was something as well. I think they're too old to compete. They need fresh blood. Don't get me wrong Henry hes still a world class player its just their team thrives on his ability. Ribery when healthy is might dangerous, but hes had problems as of late. France is still a competitive team they're expectations are just to high right now.
Hmmm I guess I'm completely wrong. Looking at their roster they have a fairly young team. And I mean very young. They're average roster age is roughly 26 years of age! Interesting..I suppose the calls to fire Domenech aren't absurd.
Here is a little something to throw in the pot:
Israel
so now we have Israel, Croatia, Bosnia, Serbia, Macedonia, and Slovenia all in the playoffs.
Catholics against Jews against Orthodox against Muslims.
There might be a juicy playoffs come next year November.
I think that sounds like FIFA's worst nightmare
I would honestly love to see Cro take on the serbs in a playoff. Of course, the game wouldn't be complete without stoppage in gameplay due to unruly fans and diciplinary action taken by FIFA on both national organizations for antics that would surely occur during the game in the aftermath.
To all of you "I want Croatia-Serbia" be careful what you wish for.
I would rather face Turkey in a rematch.
Not that I'm scared of Serbia, just think it's a "derby" could go either way. Imagine an own goal decided the leg. I have goosebumps.
I'd be more ineterested in the fights than the actual football. but ye you are right Denis...it could be a disaster if it happened....especially if it was a match that would decide who goes through from the group or something..
Post a Comment