Library draws a crowd

More than 100 people braved the early morning start to crowd the Palmerston North City Library and watch Croatia’s historic Football World Cup semifinal win over England.

Library multicultural services coordinator Jeremie Corroenne said there’d been a lot of hope riding on the game, both for the England fans and the smattering of Croatia supporters in the crowd yesterday.

Throughout the tournament England supporters have rallied to cries of ‘‘it’s coming home’’, eager for an English World Cup victory for the first time since 1966. With their win, Croatia made the final for the first time.

Throughout the game the library crowd sat in near-silence – occasionally punctuated by a collective groan for a near miss – or a smattering of abandoned cheers when a promising run petered out.

‘‘It’s a very stressful game. I just can’t watch any more,’’ said Jerin James (pictured), a lifelong football fanatic and dyed-in-the-wool England supporter.

Although in reality James couldn’t take his eyes off the screen for more than a moment. Late in the second half, the match was on a knife edge, with England and Croatia tied 1-1.

England started with a roar when wingback Kieran Trippier took a brilliant free kick that went soaring over the Croatian defence and into the net, just five minutes into the game.

James said England had a great first half, but they’d let up on the pressure in the second half and a determined Croatia scored an equaliser.

As the hard-fought game headed into extra time, it started to remind him of the 1998 World Cup quarterfinal when England lost to Argentina in a penalty shootout to resolve their 2-2 draw.

This time, England didn’t make it through extra time.

England gave Croatian striker Mario Mandzukic too much space in the penalty box and he popped in a left-foot shot to score the winning goal in the 109th minute.

Croatia play France in the final on Monday morning.