France-Croatia – M. Blazevic: “France undoubtedly deserved to win and go through to the final”

“FRANCE undoubtedly deserved to win and go through to the final. However, I think that with a little more concentration, we could have been there instead of them. I don’t think the substitution of BOBAN(10) was a decisive moment because he left with an injury. We weren’t alert and careful enough. What happened to us happens often in football.. We scored a goal and at that point we felt that FRANCE was looking deflated. Then we had a lapse of concentration for two fatal seconds which enabled them to equalise, and that fired them up and gave them new force that they didn’t appear to have before. The FRANCE team is very united, a very tight, balanced unit and I wish them good luck. I think that we can be proud of our achievement, but, as I said before, I feel we could have done better.”