1998 FIFA World Cup Final penalties after Italy's Luigi Di Biagio struck his penalty onto the crossbar. In the semi-finals, France faced tournament surprise Croatia. After a goal-less first half, Croatia took the lead in the first minute of the second half through Davor Šuker, his fifth goal of the tournament. France responded immediately with Lilian Thuram scoring his first international goal. Thuram then added a second twenty minutes from time to send France to their first ever World Cup final. The match ended in controversy however when Laurent Blanc was sent off after a skirmish with Croatia's Slaven Bilić. Bilić had sunk down to
Russia at the FIFA World Cup have won a Golden Boot award each. Salenko is the only player who has ever scored five goals in a single World Cup match, and the only player to win the Golden Boot even though his team has been eliminated in the Group stage. Russia at the FIFA World Cup Russia has participated in 4 FIFA World Cups since its independence in December 1991. The Russian Federation played their first international match against Mexico on 16 August 1992 winning 2-0. Their first participation in a World Cup was the United States of America in 1994 and they achieved 18th place.