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
2006 FIFA World Cup qualification – AFC First Round find the best of the teams that lost, who would also advance to the Second Round. The losers were compared, using the following criteria to break ties: a) number of points; b) goal difference; c) goals scored. Thus, Laos advanced to the Second Round. 2006 FIFA World Cup qualification – AFC First Round The 2006 FIFA World Cup qualification AFC play-off was the first round of the Asian Football Confederation qualification for the 2006 FIFA World Cup. The 14 teams with the lowest FIFA rankings played home-and-away knockout matches to qualify for the second stage. <div id="Turkmenistan v Afghanistan"> <div