History of the FIFA World Cup by FIFA to the regions of Asia, Oceania and Africa. The eventual qualifiers from the zone, North Korea, became the first Asian team to reach the quarter-finals, eliminating Italy in the process. England won the tournament, although João Havelange (former FIFA president from 1974 to 1998) claimed that the 1966 and 1974 World Cups were fixed so that England and Germany would win respectively. Geoff Hurst became the first and to this day the only player to score a hat-trick in a World Cup Final and Eusébio, whose team Portugal were taking part in their first World Cup, was the
Croatia at the 2018 FIFA World Cup of the second-round play-off Altogether 26 players appeared in the qualifying matches. Domagoj Vida is the only player that appeared in all 12 matches playing the full 90 minutes of all games. Mario Mandžukić was the top scorer with 5 achieved goals. Filip Bradarić, Duje Ćaleta-Car and Dominik Livaković did not appear in any of the qualifying matches but made the final World Cup squad. Complete list of players in the qualifying matches Croatia at the 2018 FIFA World Cup Croatia participated in the 2018 FIFA World Cup. This was their fifth appearance. Croatia was in Group I of UEFA's