Croatia U18

Croatia's under-18s have worn the Vatreni badge against Norway, Poland, the United Arab Emirates, Belgium, Qatar, Italy and Algeria without settling into any one grudge.

The squad trains at the Hitrec-Kacian pitch tucked under the eastern stand of Maksimir. When Luka Modrić pulled on the shirt in 2003 he made seven appearances at this level before his career moved on; Dejan Lovren's two caps in 2006 marked the same kind of brief, functional stop on the way through the age groups.

A note left on a Wikipedia talk page credits Croatia with third place at the 1998 UEFA European Under-18 Championship, though nothing sturdier backs it up, so the honour sits as a claim rather than a fact worth building on. What the team does year to year is friendlies, run by the Croatian Football Federation as preparation rather than competition for silverware, which makes the opponent list itself the closest thing to a record: whoever UEFA's youth calendar puts in front of them next, with Italy the one name that keeps recurring.