"Very suspicious" - Croatia coach questions decisions leading to Argentina's first goal in FIFA World Cup semifinal

Croatia boss Zlatko Dalic has questioned the decision to award Argentina a penalty in their FIFA World Cup semifinal clash yesterday, December 13. He believes the new rules that hand a penalty for such contact are too cheap and easy to get.

Argentina progressed to the FIFA World Cup final on Tuesday night after a 3-0 win over Croatia. Lionel Messi opened the scoring from the spot before Julian Alvarez scored in each half to help the South American side seal a comfortable win.

Alvarez won the penalty for Argentina's first goal after he clattered into goalkeeper Dominik Livakovic in the box. However, speaking after the match, Dalic was not pleased with the new rules awarding La Albiceleste a penalty for any contact with the goalkeeper.

He said:

"We played well for half an hour but we were not specific in our actions. We conceded a goal which was very suspicious. First the situation for the corner — according to the reaction of my players, the referee didn't call it."

He added:

"Then the situation with the penalty. It was a little bit too cheap and too easy, to be honest. Then we tried to go back and we conceded a second goal. We had ball possession but we made no specific opportunities."

The Croatian coach continued:

"They had control over us and the ball possession was not in our hands. We had a corner that was called by the referee and then a counter-attack where our goalkeeper did what he did and these new rules… Otherwise I will not say that we will be objecting to the referees (but) I think the first goal took the match in a different direction."

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Dalic praises Lionel Messi after FIFA World Cup loss

Zlatko Dalic went on to praise Lionel Messi for his performance in the semifinal and called him the best player in the world.

He admitted that the Paris Saint-Germain playmaker makes the difference for Argentina and said:

"Well, not much needs to be said about Messi's qualities. In the past 15 years he's probably the best player in the world. He was good and dangerous and makes a difference in the Argentina team. He has the explosivity and technique at a very high performance and it's the true Messi we expected to see."

Morocco and France battle it out in the second semifinal today to face Argentina in the FIFA World Cup final on Sunday (December 18).