FIFA issue statement after Croatia's 103rd minute equaliser ruled out by VAR

Croatia suffered one of the most bizarre decisions in World Cup history against Portugal this evening, and the reason why has been explained.

The Luka Modrić-led side was on the receiving end of a 2-1 defeat against Cristiano Ronaldo's Portugal in tonight's World Cup clash, with a place in the Round of 16 up for grabs.

Croatia opened the scoring in the 53rd minute via an Ivan Perišić strike, and performed largely as the dominant side for the match's duration.

Ronaldo was deemed narrowly offside in what appeared to be a goal back for Portugal, before a spot kick changed everything.

Portugal were awarded a penalty minutes later after a foul on Renato Veiga, giving the iconic #7 the chance to make history.

Prior to tonight, Ronaldo had never scored a knock-out goal at the World Cup in his 20-year-long career playing on the stage, but the 40-year-old stepped up and converted his spot kick to tie proceedings up at 1-1.

The Portuguese maestro was later substituted to boos directed at Roberto Martinez, with fans perplexed by the decision, however, the man who arrived in his place, Gonçalo Ramos, scored a 94th-minute winner for his nation.

Croatia's 103rd-minute strike was disallowed due to in-ball sensors at the 2026 World Cup

Incredibly, in the 103rd-minute, Joško Gvardiol believed that he tied things up for Croatia with a neat finish in the box past Portugal shot-stopper Diogo Costa.

The goal was instead deemed to be offside due to two players in the build-up, Igor Matanović and Mario Pašalić.

As a cross was played in, the former appeared to miss his header, with the ball instead hitting Portugal's Veiga and bouncing into the latter's path, who touched it across goal onto the boot of Gvardiol.

However, if Matanović had indeed touched the ball at the moment he appeared to have missed it, then Pašalić was visibly in an offside position when he took the cross down and assisted the Croatian goalscorer.

Bizarrely, Norwegian referee Espen Eskas was called to the VAR screen to see various angles of the incident, none of which seemed capable of deciding with certainty whether Matanović had touched the ball.

At first, it appeared that Eskas believed the angles he was shown did provide conclusive proof of a flick-on, rendering Pašalić offside and denying Croatia what would have been a legendary World Cup equaliser against the Portuguese.

However, the explanation behind this last-minute decision is supposedly a sensor placed within the football that registers even the slightest of touches, thus confirming Matanović's involvement and providing definitive proof of a flick-on.

Fans online expressed outrage, and sympathy, at the decision, questioning why Eskas was called over to the screen if the sensor had been used to disallow the goal.

"I have yet to see an angle where it's clear he touched the ball," wrote one fan, while another questioned "If that supposed [sensor] even exists, then why call the referee?"

That question also appears to have been answered, with the referee having been instructed to check whether Portugal's Veiga, whose back the football bounced off of, had made a deliberate attempt to play the ball, in which case no offside would have been called.

The incident provoked mass controversy and FIFA moved to issue a statement explaining concretely the motivations behind the decision.

FIFA issued a statement on the offside controversy. Image: FIFA

The governing body confirmed that sensors in the ball detected a touch from Matanović.

In a statement released on X alongside an image of the incident, FIFA said: "According to the data provided by Connected Ball Technology housed within the Adidas ball Trionda, the official match ball of the FIFA World Cup, it was proven that contact was made by Croatia's Igor Matanovic in the build up to the goal against Portugal, allowing the referee to correctly determine offside and disallow the goal.

"IMU sensors housed within the Trionda ball are capable of determining any slight contact, displayed to viewers in the broadcast as a 'heartbeat graphic', and allowing officials an unprecedented level of data to make fast, accurate decisions."