Croatia vs Senegal Prediction & Betting Tips - International Friendlies

Prediction published on 05/06/2018, 15:03  by Steve Ashfield | Modified on 12/06/2018 at 03:58 in Football Predictions

Croatia begin two successive games against African sides with a home friendly against Senegal. This should warm them up nicely for their opening World Cup game against Tunisia on June 16. They qualified for Russia after finishing second behind Iceland in Group I and then defeating Greece in the play-offs. Home form helped them qualify with no defeats in their group and the all-important 4-1 home win over the Greeks. Form isn't exactly world beating at present with only a win in Mexico in their last four matches. If the World Cup was held in Croatia, they might win it because they last lost at home iin 2013. They won't be expecting as big a win as in their last home friendly, a 10-0 win over San Marino just before Euro 2016 but they should be able to get a confidence boosting win before heading off to Russia.

Their opponents take on Poland, Japan and Colombia in their World Cup group after comfortably winning their group by five points, though they'll be hoping there are no dodgy referees in Russia after the problems they had against South Africa. They do have a few on-field problems though as they haven't won a match this year, then again they haven't lost either as all three of their games in 2018 have ended in draws. That takes their unbeaten run to eight games but five have ended in draws. Friendlies are never easy to predict, especially when you might be keen to get as many players some time on the pitch before the tournament begins, but Croatia can get the win here.