World Cup 2022 LIVE: Croatia vs Belgium latest score and goal updates as captain Eden Hazard dropped

9 minutes: Leandro Trossard and Josko Gvardiol come collectively as Trossard makes an attempt to carry up the ball in the course of the pitch. He does nicely to maintain the defender at bay and wins Belgium a free kick.

They work it properly into the ultimate third the place Yannick Carrasco takes a shot that Marcelo Brozovic will get in behind and blocks.

6 minutes: In the opposite Group F match happening proper now Hakim Ziyech has scored for Morocco towards Canada already.

That means as it stands Belgium should beat Croatia to be able to attain the last-16. Croatia will undergo if this ends in a draw.

3 minutes: Belgium are settling down after that early probability. A protracted ball is booted up the pitch and is fantastically introduced down by Leandro Trossard.

He spins away from a problem and seems to pick Yannick Carrasco on the sting of the field however his go will get intercepted.

Croatia get the ball rolling on this essential World Cup group stage outing. Whoever loses is more likely to go dwelling.

The ball comes over to Luka Modric who fires an extended diagonal over to Ivan Perisic on the left facet of the penalty space. Perisic brings the ball down, rolls it onto his proper foot and blasts one broad of the far submit!

Massive probability straightaway for Croatia!

Luka Modric leads out Croatia with Kevin De Bruyne captaining Belgium after Eden Hazard was dropped to the bench. Belgium have by no means misplaced back-to-back matches beneath Roberto Martinez but when they accomplish that tonight they’ll be out of the World Cup.

37-year-old Luka Modric is showing in his fourth World Cup. The midfielder is a five-time Champions League winner and helped his nation attain the World Cup ultimate in Russia 4 years in the past.

But, this might be his ultimate outing within the World Cup if issues don’t go nicely for Croatia right now.

Veteran defender Jan Vertonghen has hit again at Kevin De Bruyne’s declare that Belgium are “too old” to win the World Cup, amid stories of a serious dressing room bust-up following their chastening defeat by the hands of Morocco on Monday.

Belgium went down 2-0 to a powerful Morocco efficiency to go away themselves third in Group F with one sport to play, a vital showdown towards group leaders Croatia.

Roberto Martinez’s facet had been the world’s No1 ranked facet as lately as final yr however their golden era of expertise is coming in the direction of the top of its cycle and there may be concern over the shortage of appropriate younger replacements for stalwarts just like the 35-year-old Vertonghen and his defensive companion Toby Alderweireld, 33.

Croatia have solely misplaced two of their 10 conferences with fellow European nations at World Cups (W6, D2), with each of these coming towards France (1998 semi-final, 2018 ultimate).

Their solely defeat in 18 matches in all competitions (W12, D5) was a 3-0 Nations League loss to Austria in June.

The followers have made their method to the Ahmad bin Ali Stadium the place one in all these two groups is more likely to get knocked out of the World Cup on the expense of the opposite.

The 2022 World Cup is in full swing as 32 nations started on 20 November aiming to carry the Jules Rimet trophy in Doha on 18 December.

The event is the primary Fifa males’s World Cup to play out within the northern hemisphere’s winter, after it was moved from its authentic summer season scheduling to fight Qatar’s intense warmth.

Brazil got here into event as the slight favourites to win the World Cup forward of their South American rivals Argentina. The most fancied European nations initially of the competitors had been England, Spain, France and Germany, with Belgium and Netherlands additionally thought of darkish horses. As the African champions, Senegal had been thought of Africa’s finest hope of delivering a primary World Cup for the continent.

The event has not been with out controversy, from the mid-season scheduling which has seen a raft of accidents within the lead-up to kick-off, to the broader image of Qatar’s exploitation of migrant staff to be able to construct the stadiums and infrastructure required to host the four-week occasion. Fifa president Gianni Infantino solely added gasoline to the fireplace when he gave his extraordinary pre-tournament speech, and what has adopted has been vigorous debate round displaying assist for LGBTQ+ rights in a conservative Islamic nation the place homosexuality is against the law.

Despite the off-field points, the gamers on the pitch have nonetheless served up an entertaining event, with objectives, shocks, twists and turns.