Luka Modric Achieves 200 Caps as Croatia Defeats Panama

The numbers say 200. The night felt like much more than that.

In Toronto, under the sharp glare of a tournament that had already bloodied Croatia’s nose, Luka Modric walked out and joined a club reserved for football’s immortals. Cristiano Ronaldo. Lionel Messi. Bader al-Mutawa. Now, Modric. Two hundred senior caps for his country, and still dictating the rhythm.

There were no wild gestures from him, no theatrical lap of honour. That is not Modric. His teammates did the shouting for him, pulling on black T-shirts emblazoned with “Infinite Legacy” and the number 200 as the final whistle sounded. The message was blunt: this is not just longevity, it is a standard.

“He is still influencing matches and to play for your country 200 times, that is a lot. We need to be very happy to have him in the team,” said Zlatko Dalic afterwards, his captain again at the centre of everything. “Luka is very humble and this is why he is not for major celebrations. But I am very glad we marked this today in front of our fans.”

On the pitch, though, there was little room for sentiment. Croatia arrived here wounded after an opening defeat to England. Panama arrived with a plan and a formation that screamed defiance.

Panama’s wall and Dalic’s gamble

For 45 minutes, Thomas Christiansen’s 5-4-1 system strangled the game. Croatia had the ball, Panama had the answers. Lines stayed tight, distances short, gaps non-existent. Every Modric touch seemed to meet a red shirt within seconds.

The best chance of the half did not fall to the favourites. It belonged to Panama. Jose Luis Rodriguez rose to meet a cross and his header flicked off a defender, looping towards the top corner. Dominik Livakovic, scrambling, got just enough on it to divert the ball onto the underside of the bar. Croatia exhaled. Panama believed.

Dalic needed something different. At the interval, he reached for a classic centre-forward. Ante Budimir, Osasuna’s all-time top scorer, came on to give Croatia a focal point, a body to occupy the centre-backs and a target for the waves of possession that had been crashing harmlessly around Panama’s penalty area.

The change altered the geometry of the match. Suddenly, defenders had a decision to make: step towards Modric and the midfield, or stay tight to Budimir. Doubt crept in. Space followed.

Budimir breaks the deadlock

The breakthrough arrived in the 54th minute and it came with a touch of invention Croatia had been missing.

Marco Pasalic, drifting into a pocket on the right, received the ball with his back to goal and a defender at his shoulder. One flick of the heel, a clever backheel into space, and Josip Stanisic was racing onto it. The full-back did not hesitate, driving a low cross beyond the near-post crowd and into the corridor where strikers live.

At the back post, Budimir had peeled away. Calm, balanced, he opened his body and guided the ball home. No power, just precision. One chance, one finish. Croatia 1, Panama 0, and the mood in the stadium flipped.

The Croatian end erupted. Flags whipped, flares crackled, and the tension that had gripped Dalic’s side loosened in an instant. The goal did not just change the scoreline; it changed the temperature of Croatia’s campaign.

The pressure almost produced a second immediately. Pasalic burst clear, clean through on Orlando Mosquera, with the game there to be killed. The Panama goalkeeper stood tall, blocked the first effort, and watched as the rebound was lashed over the bar. A huge chance, wasted. The kind of miss that can haunt a team if the tide turns.

Panama’s fight, Croatia’s edge

Panama did not fold. Eliminated by the final whistle or not, they refused to let their tournament end with a whimper.

Christiansen’s side pushed Croatia back for spells of the second half. They forced seven corners, slung balls into the box, and made Livakovic earn his clean sheet with a series of sharp interventions. The Canaleros chased every second ball, every loose touch, as if their fate could still be rewritten.

“They played with that hunger, with that dedication, with that spirit. That’s what we wanted of the team. I’m super proud of them,” Christiansen said. “They [Croatia] put two shots on goal and scored one.” There was frustration in the numbers, pride in the performance.

Yet the truth of Panama’s campaign cut through all that effort: they never found a way to score when it mattered. Two games, zero points, and now a final meeting with England that will be about pride rather than progression.

Croatia, by contrast, found enough. Not a flowing, ruthless display, but a controlled, seasoned one. The kind of performance forged over years of tournament football, where one tactical tweak and one composed finish can be the difference between life and death in the group.

Group L blown wide open

The earlier 0-0 draw between England and Ghana had already twisted Group L into something intriguing. That stalemate left both sides on four points. Croatia’s win moved them to three and dragged them back into the conversation.

Now the equations are simple and brutal. Beat Ghana in Philadelphia, and Croatia are through to the last 32. Anything less, and they will be checking scores and counting goal differences. England, on four points and facing an already-eliminated Panama, need only avoid defeat to progress.

Inside the Croatian camp, the sense of release was obvious. “We were pretty aware of our quality and the situation that we were in,” Pasalic admitted. “What we didn’t do in the first half, we did in the second half. We’ve been relieved of the burden and now we can move on.”

Move on to Ghana. Move on with Modric still at the helm.

At 40, on cap 200, he remains the reference point, the player his teammates look for when the ball burns and the noise rises. Nights like this are why he stayed, why Dalic keeps building around him, why Croatia still believe they can punch above their weight on the biggest stage.

The group is tight, the margin for error thin, but Croatia are alive again. With momentum finally shifting their way and their captain still bending time to his will, who really wants to be the ones to push them out of this tournament?