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#2 Helmed the Croatian National Team
On 5 July 2012, Igor Stimac was appointed the Head Coach of the Croatian National side. His first game as the Croatian Head Coach was against Switzerland in a friendly, which resulted in a disappointing 4-2 loss for the Croats.
Croatia began their FIFA World Cup 2014 qualification campaign under him in a decent fashion. Mateo Kovacic (now with Chelsea), Ante Rebic (Eintracht Frankfurt) and Alen Halilovic (Standard Liège) were all handed their international debuts against Serbia, Liechtenstein and Portugal by Stimac. Midfield maestros like Real Madrid's Luka Modric and Barcelona's Ivan Rakitic bettered their game under his tenure as well.
Croatia kept winning their qualification games but the fans were far from satisfied with Igor Stimac. Croatia did manage to eke out 16 points from their 6 games but the team was struggling to score. Goals were hard to find by from open play and Stimac's side had to resort to excessive dependency on counter-attacks and set-pieces to score.
Croatia went through a poor patch of results, which included losses to Scotland and Portugal. They also struggled to defeat lowly-ranked Liechtenstein. Croatia drew 1-1 with Serbia, lost 2-1 to Belgium before losing 0-2 to Scotland in the next set of World Qualification games.
The fans were agitated and Stimac had to submit his resignation to the Croatian Football Federation after his loss to Scotland. His resignation was accepted.
Croatia, however, did manage to qualify for the World Cup in Brazil courtesy finishing second in the last second-placed sides in the Europe Qualification Round.
Despite having largely an underwhelming tenure with the Croatian National side, Stimac does get the credit to take Croatia to 4th in the FIFA Men's Rankings from 9th in just a year.
