Slovenia steal late goal to draw friendly with Croatia

Slovenia's

Jaka Bijol

scored his first international goal, in stoppage time, to cancel out a first-half strike from

Andrej Kramaric

and give his team a 1-1 draw with

Croatia

in a friendly on Saturday.


Kramaric latched on to a long pass from Duje Caleta-Car and beat Slovenian goalkeeper Jan Oblak in a one-on-one to give Croatia the lead at the Education City Stadium in Al Rayyan, Qatar one of the venues for November's World Cup.

Croatia were unable to capitalise on their dominance throughout the match and were punished with seconds left to play when Bijol's header bounced off the underside of the crossbar and just crossed the line.

Both teams were part of the same World Cup qualifying group which Croatia, runners-up at the 2018 tournament in Russia, won to secure an automatic berth at this year's finals, while Slovenia finished fourth and failed to qualify for Qatar.

Zlatko Dalic

's Croatia take on Bulgaria on Tuesday at the same venue, while Slovenia will play Qatar later the same day.