The world cup has reached its final game of the tournament! The final will go between France and Croatia! I guess we can say that it is no surprise that France did reach the final, but that Croatia is in there is!

Roads to the Final:

France was one of the favorites before the tournament to lift the cup, so it is no surprise that they do have the change to take it!

Let's see how their tournament did evolve!


France vs Australia: 2 - 1

In their first game France did beat Australia, who didn't wanted to go down without a fight! At half time the game was still tied at 0-0 but did open up after the break! Both teams got rewarded a penalty, which they both scored. And France did net the winning goal in the 81th minute!

France vs Peru: 1 - 0

Their second game was against Peru. Mbappe opened the score in the 34th minute and that was enough to take the win! Remarkably that France only did have a possession of 44%!

France vs Denmark: 0 - 0

Nothing much to report about this game, which was one of the dullest of the tournament. Both teams were qualified with this draw!

France vs Argentina: 4 - 3

Here we do have a game which will be remembered. I couldn't watch it because I was at the airport! This was the first and only time that France got behind! They got 1 - 0 ahead after a penalty converted by Griezmann, but Argentina took the lead with goals from Di Maria and Mercado!
But then France unleashed their power and turned the game around in 11 minutes time, with goals from Pavard and two of Mbappe. The goals in the extra time of Aguero, was one for the statistics! But here again France only had a possession of 41%.

France vs Uruguay: 2 - 0

Goals of Varane and Griezmann did the job for France!

France vs Belgium: 1 - 0

This was the final before the final. In the first halve both team has some superior time but no goals where scored! It was clear during the halve time that the one who would score first would qualify for the Final! And France did convert a corner into a goal, when Umtiti beat Fellaine in a heading duel! After that they just killed the game! Belgium had some small chances but the France wall didn't move an inch!
Again a remarkable possession statistic for France with only 40%.

Stats:

  • 5 wins, 1 draw
  • 4 clean sheets
  • 10 goals scored, 4 goals against!


The road to the final for Croatia was a little bit longer than the one of France! We could say that the were on the easy side of the bracket! But in the end, this doesn't matter!
Due to the fact that I didn't expect Croatia in the final before the tournament, I didn't pay close attention to them in the early phases of the World Cup!

Croatia vs Nigeria: 2 - 0

Croatia did start their tournament with a deserved 2 - 0 victory over Nigeria! They did need a penalty and an Nigerian own-goal to do this! Modric converted the penalty!
Croatia had a ball possession of 54%

Croatia - Argentina: 3 - 0

Well how about that. They just humiliated Argentina, who did need the win, with 3 - 0. All 3 goals were scored in the second half! Rebic, again Modric and Rakitic did score the goals! We could say that Argentina did play a great tournament but they were just over classed by Croatia!
Croatia only had a possession of 42% but did had 15 goal attempts!

Croatia - Iceland: 2 -1

With a win Iceland would have probably qualified for the round of 16! Croatia on the other side, was already assured of that! Iceland did equalized in the 79th minute with a penalty. The first goal Croatia did had to accept in the tournament! But Perisic scored in the duying minutes of the game, eliminating Iceland and giving Croatia the group win with 9 points and only 1 goal against!

Croatia - Denmark: 1 - 1 after penalties!

Before this game, Croatia was the huge favorite for me, but they did need penalties to qualify for the quarters!
4 minutes after the games started it was already 1 - 1 after goals from Jorgensen and Mandzukic!
Modric missed an penalty in the extra time, resulting in a penalty shoot out, which Croatia did win with 3 - 2!

Croatia - Russia:  2 - 2 after penalties

Again Croatia was the huge favorite, playing against the home side! And again in this game, the result after 90 minutes was 1-1!
Russia opened the score after 31 minutes and Croatia equalized via Kramaric! This was the first time Croatia was behind in the tournament!
In extra time, Vida scored with a great header, thinking that this would seal the deal, but Russia stood up once again and brought the game to penalties with another header goal in the 115th minute!
The penalty shoot out was won with 4 - 2!

Croatia vs England: 2 - 1 after extra time!

Third knock out game for Croatia and third time that they had to play extra time! Meaning that they will start the final with 90 minutes more play time than France!
Trippier scored pretty fast after 5 minutes and Croatia did only equalize in the 68th minute of the game! In the second half of extra time, Mandzukic opened up the gates to the final!

My bets:

Nitrogensports.eu

On Nitrogen I will go for the over. I do see a tie during half time, which could be 1 - 1 or 0 - 0. During the second half, Croatia will start to feel the extra 90 minutes they had to play, which will result in France lifting the cup!

Unibet

I do see Griezmann find the net and both teams will score! This last bet is against all statistics, because I doesn't happen a lot that both teams to score in the final!

Lars Supertip!

The final prediction of my oldest son! He will end the world cup in green figures with his correct score bets!

It would be great if he can predict the correct score of the final, to end it in style!

He does see France winning after 90 minutes with 2 - 1!






And you?

What do you think about this final?
Will France win their second World Cup or will Croatia upset them and lift their first?

Cheers,
Peter