Italy vs Croatia Prediction 17 February 2024

The best guide to the matchup of the decisive stage of the World Cup between Italy and Croatia is our prediction. Both national teams conquered the current competition relatively recently (in 2019 and 2017). However, with motivation everything is still in perfect order for both.

For Italy, the path to triumph in Qatar was quite thorny, but after an unpleasant defeat to Hungary in the group stage (12:13), it made the right conclusions. The mistake forced the team to return to a more cautious playing style, which brought a positive effect in the shortest possible time. In the playoffs, the "white and blue" made 30 losses with 15 blocks and 10 steals, leaving the Americans (13:12), Greeks (11:10) and Spaniards (8:6) with nothing.

Croatia felt confident in its abilities at the home World Cup a month earlier (2nd place). Although then it looked a little more impressive than now. In the group stage the squad did not provide proper resistance to Spain (6:10), which was a kind of "cold shower". Yesterday, the Checkers defeated the French only in a shootout (17:16), playing quite aggressively in the fight (16 personal fouls).