Japan and Croatia finished equals and neither of the coaches is too happy with the result.

ZICO (JPN)
It was a very equal game. We didn’t lose, so we are still in the tournament. I think we played very well. It was very difficult to play at this time because of the heat and we have done this twice in succession. The players have suffered, but they did so well.

We didn’t create a lot of opportunities and when we did, we felt too much pressure. That was the problem. We’re working every day on putting the ball into the back of the net, but that’s training. It’s so much harder when you’re playing in a World Cup match.

Croatia had good opportunities in the first half, but we did well in the second half. If we had played that way against Australia, the scoreline might have been different. We still believe that we can beat Brazil. Football throws up some unexpected results and although we respect Brazil, we will give them a real battle. If we do get knocked out, we will leave this competition with our heads held high.

Zlatko KRANJCAR (CRO)
The heat was tough, but I thought we played well. I’d like to congratulate the players of both teams for a good match. We dominated, created a lot of chances, but unfortunately we were out of luck. We shouldn’t be disappointed, because our players have enough strength and ability to make it through.

I thought it was the correct decision to award the penalty and I thought it was a truly wonderful save from Japan’s goalkeeper, but that summed up our luck. However, sometimes you make your own luck. We had a number of corner kicks, we were able to put a number of high balls into the box, but we did not make the most of them. I think if you look at the game as a whole, we were better organised and we created the better chances. That said, I feel that we lost two points today.

Source: WCoffsite