Southgate believes Croatian confidence can be used as motivation
Gareth Southgate insists that England will happily use any comments from over-confident Croatians as a motivational tool for today’s showdown.
Victory for either country will see them win their Nations League group and qualify for next summer’s semi-final.
Having beaten England in the semifinal of the World Cup, Croatia believe history will repeat itself. Right-back Tin Jedvaj, who scored twice including a dramatic injury-time winner in the 3-2 victory over Spain on Thursday night to set up this final game decider, went as far as to claim his side are favourites for this fixture.
But it’s nothing new for Southgate. During the World Cup, he claimed comments from former Swedish international Hakan Mild provided a little more impetus for England to go on and win their quarter-final.
“Whenever people speak, you give the opposition the opportunity to use those words as they see fit,” he says.
“There were some comments from Sweden in the summer that we definitely used to our advantage. You can steer that in any way you want because half the players thought it was a current Sweden player when it wasn’t, so I wasn’t going to argue with them.
“You always have to be conscious of how your words can provide motivation to the opposition.
“But for Croatia, it’s about how our mindset is for the game. We’ve got to play bloody well.
“They are a good team, and with and without the ball, we have to be spot on to beat them.”
Just four months on from losing to the Croatians in Moscow, this new competition offers England an immediate chance to reach a second
semi-final in the space of 12 months after so many years without gracing the latter stages of tournaments.
The double-headers with Croatia and Spain respectively have also enabled Southgate to build on what he started in the summer.
So whatever people may think of the Nations League, you won’t find a critic of it in the England manager.
“We knew that we faced some really challenging matches,” he adds.
“That is always exciting and it’s what we needed as a team.
“It has meant an unprecedented year in terms of the quality of fixtures and the challenges, but you learn so much more from playing against the better teams. That has really helped us to progress.
“It’s not a European Championships or a World Cup, but these are good habits to get into. We want to win the big matches and ones where there is a bit more pressure and emphasis.
“Wherever the Nations League sits we won’t know, but these are really good experiences for the team.
“When they started to have a European Championships, a lot of teams didn’t enter and these things evolve.
“But I thought the idea of a competition where all the best teams are playing against each other was an exciting concept.”