France and Croatia will face off in the World Cup final this Sunday after winning their semifinals matches, and it's a contest that is loaded with talent. Even the average soccer fan knows just how stacked France is, but Croatia is a team that also has its fair share of superstars who have helped carry this team.
Before you lock in your 2018 World Cup picks for France vs. Croatia, you need to see what European football expert David Sumpter has to say. Sumpter is an applied mathematician who wrote "Soccermatics," a book that explains how math works inside the sport. Along with other experienced analysts, Sumpter developed the powerful Soccerbot model. The Soccerbot reads current odds and all team performance data, calculates key metrics and predicts upcoming matches. In nearly three seasons since its inception, the Soccerbot is up an incredible 1,800 percent on bookmakers' closing odds. The model is crushing the World Cup knockout stage. It strongly recommending Croatia as an underdog at +135 against England in the semifinals. The result: Croatia stamped its ticket to the Russia 2018 final with a thrilling 2-1 victory.
“First of all, it’s a huge pleasure and a privilege to play in such a match,” Deschamps said Saturday. “There is nothing more beautiful, nothing stronger when one is a football player.”
That measured voice of a 49-year-old came from a different era than the voice of the 29-year-old French captain and defensive midfielder also named Didier Deschamps. This same juncture 20 years ago found the French players lamenting the dreariness of their own home audience in the semifinal against Croatia.
This will be France's second consecutive major tournament final after Euro 2016, when Les Bleus were beaten by Portugal in extra time.
