Kovač: "Everybody deserved the best grades"

Croatian national football team managed to reach the World Cup, with a successful play-off campaign against Iceland. Croatia took the lead in the second leg, then had a player sent off, yet continued to impress and scored the second goal.

Red card was shown to the first goalscorer, Mario Mandžukić. "I have seen the replay and the red card was deserved. A lot of things went through my head at that moment, but already at half-time I believed in my team and I knew we can hold on to the very end. Mandžukić feels sorry, but that is a part of the sport as well. At the same time, he is happy about the goal, and I hope he will not be severely sanctioned", said Niko Kovač, Croatia head coach, after the important victory.

"My players deserve all the praise", he summarized.

Kovač also said a couple of words about the excellent ten-men Croatian performance in the second half: "As I've explained after the match in Iceland, it is not easy to play against ten men. Iceland played as usual, with long balls and crosses, hoping one of those balls would end up in the net. Being a man down, Croatia showed character, playing superbly both in defence and attack. We could have scored four or five".

"Everybody deserved the best grades, everybody gave all they had, even more. We were good in Reykjavik already, but we missed the final touch. Now we have more time to practice and I hope this is only the beginning. I have a vision, I have good players and I couldn't be more satisfied", Kovač continued.

The head coach emphasized: "We have to give credit to the former head coach Štimac, who secured the second place in the group and made the World Cup qualification possible. We'd like to thank the media and the supporters, it was really nice to play in this atmosphere".

There is plenty of time left until the World Cup and Kovač is taking one step at the time: "We have a lot of work to do. My players will be at their best for the final tournament".

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