'Forever Ainawi' Zlatko Dalic leads Croatia in another hunt for glory at Euro 2024

From Al Ain to a fourth major international football tournament, with a World Cup runners-up finish and a third place, too, in between.

It represents a route so remarkable that it bears reminding.

Croatia head coach Zlatko Dalic spent three years as Al Ain manager from 2014, guiding the UAE club back to the summit of domestic football – he won the President’s Cup in his first season, the UAE league title the next – and to within a penalty kick of clinching the 2016 Asian Champions League.

Little more than a year and a half later, Dalic was on the touchline in Moscow as Croatia fell 4-2 to France in the 2018 World Cup final. An underdog coach had led an underdog side to its best finish at a global finals.

In 2022, and with countryman Dalic still at the helm, a ceaseless Croatia finally ran out of legs in the World Cup semi-finals in Qatar, although they recharged enough to defeat Morocco in the play-off for third. Experiencing his first job in senior international football, Dalic had a World Cup bronze to go with the silver, and an already extraordinary CV had another out-of-the-ordinary entry.

Now, Dalic will bid to usher Croatia beyond the quarter-finals of a European Championship for the first time in the country’s history – they fell at the last-16 stage in the past two editions – beginning with progression from a Euro 2024 Group B in Germany that contains defending champions Italy, three-time winners Spain, and Albania. They kick off their campaign on Saturday, against Spain in Berlin.

If Croatia are often labelled perennial overachievers, then Dalic is the perfect man to plot their path. He arrived at Al Ain in January 2014 as a relative unknown after modest stints in Saudi Arabia with Al Faisaly and Al Hilal.