Bilic's Croatians boys stutter at destiny's call

How to blow it, Croatian style. With at least four gilded chances in regular time and a 119th-minute goal that seemed to impale the Turks, world football's biggest over-achievers then tossed away a semi-final place by borrowing England's penalty-taking record.

Slaven Bilic's ecstatic gallop across the pitch when Ivan Klasnic broke the long stalemate with 90 seconds of extra-time left will go down as the most premature celebration in European Championship history.

But how was Bilic to know that Turkey would dash to the other end of the field and equalise in the dying seconds before humiliating his side 3-1 in the penalty shoot-out?

Stressed: Croatia coach Bilic

Frankly, Croatia's spot-kicks were abysmal, as was their finishing over 120 minutes of one-sided combat. Turkey looked the weakest of the quarter-finalists, but they advance to a semi-final against Germany as the fightback-artists of this ceaselessly entertaining tournament.

A turgid contest exploded into life-rivetting colour as the teams were starting to stagger across the grass, almost two hours into their duel. If Croatia are a nation of only 4.5 million souls, each one must have sent a relative here.

For their anthem, Croats slip into a kind of nationalistic trance. The much smaller Turkish contingent must have felt they had stumbled into a political rally in Zagreb.

For a definition of Croatian ambition, turn to the brilliant first-half sequence that started with Darijo Srna slipping a pass down a channel to the speeding Luka Modric, who whipped the ball in for Ivica Olic to crash against the bar, Niko Kranjcar unable to direct the rebound downwards with his header. Olic's miss was not the point of the story. It was the lacerating width and pace of Croatia's attack.

The most entertaining sides use the width of the field to get behind defenders, and in Srna (right) and Ivan Rakitic and the overlapping Danijel Pranjic (left), Bilic had wide men capable of feeding off the clever angled passes of Modric and Nico Kovac. Sorry to mention England, given that they're not even here, but one of Fabio Capello's biggest deficits is speed along the flanks.

Joe Cole has been pressed into service at outside left, but is no natural winger, and David Bentley is no whippet. David Beckham is a static figure these days and Stewart Downing lacks true international class.

Hence England's crab-like play and their over-reliance on long balls. But back to Turkish defiance. First we saw them fight back from 2-0 down against the Czech Republic, and now Croatia have been dispatched.

Turkey: specialist subject - breaking hearts. In the great denouement, and in Croatia's failure to take several simple chances, there was clear evidence of susceptibility to real big-game pressure.

Bilic admitted after their opening game against Austria that anxiety had undermined his squad. The affliction struck again last night. History was calling Croatia on. But they trembled and fell at its threshold.