Livakovic, Croatia’s new hero

Dominik Livakovic is Croatia’s new national hero. The goalkeeper of the Balkan team sealed Zlatko Dalic’s team’s place in the quarterfinals with a stunning penalty shootout performance against Japanalready stopped three pitches. Croatia has had a goalkeeper for years, as the current Dinamo Zagreb goalkeeper is only 27 years old.

gg.didomi.doWhenConsent(!window.didomiBypass, ‘c:twitterwi-wUmBnnKy’, function () {
var x = document.createElement(‘script’);
x.setAttribute(“type”,”text/javascript”);
x.setAttribute(“src”, “//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js”);
x.setAttribute(“charset”, “utf-8”);
$(“.twitter-tweet”).closest( “span” ).append(x);
});

Livakovic can be considered a rightful heir of Danijel Subasic, who stepped aside after the 2018 World Cup in Russia, where Croatia finished runner-up in the world. In fact, towards the said milestone, the former checkers goalkeeper also starred in a fine penalty shootout, stopping three shots against Denmark. Just like his replacement on Monday against Japan.

gg.didomi.doWhenConsent(!window.didomiBypass, ‘c:twitterwi-wUmBnnKy’, function () {
var x = document.createElement(‘script’);
x.setAttribute(“type”,”text/javascript”);
x.setAttribute(“src”, “//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js”);
x.setAttribute(“charset”, “utf-8”);
$(“.twitter-tweet”).closest( “span” ).append(x);
});

The only other goalkeeper to have saved three maximum penalties in a World Cup shootout was Portugal’s Ricardo in 2006 against England.

Who is Livakovic?

His career at club level started with Zardar, where he debuted at just 17 years old. His performance attracted the attention of Dynamo Zagreb, who did not hesitate to sign him in 2015, although he loaned him another season to Zardar so he could finish training. In four courses he accumulated 108 games in which he scored a total of 162 goals.

After the departure of Eduardo Carvalho from Dinamo, Livaković became the first goalkeeper for the Zagreb club. He made his debut on October 2, 2016 in a match against Hajduk Split and since then he has not stopped growing.

His numbers have improved dramatically., and received 213 goals in 262 games. It was after the 2018 World Cup that he finally became a starter in Croatia, although Dalic also wanted to test other goalkeepers such as Grbic and Ivusic.

But there is no doubt his most famous performance came in Qatar, where he gave his team the pass to the quarterfinals with three saves in the penalty shootout.

He stopped the first two pitches that’s a sign he has not been achieved by anyone in the history of the Mundiales- and put the passport on the track in the next round. Minamino and Mitoma were unable to fool him, as was Yoshida, who established himself as Croatia’s great hero in this World Cup.