Intro:

Croatia coach Slaven Bilic said Saturday's (2nd June) friendly against Norway was chosen deliberately to play against a team with a similar 'style and philosophy' as Euro 2012 Group C opponents Ireland.

Script:

SOUNDBITE: (English) Slaven Bilic, Croatia coach:

"I think it's the first time that Croatia is playing in Norway... ok, we played Norway two times in the last couple of years and in both games we won and (in) both of the games we played really good, really good. And they played also great games. These are like not typical friendly games. They were very competitive. So, basically, tomorrow night, we expect the same. When I was choosing the opponents, like six months ago, when we found out that we were going to play in this group (Group C, with Spain, Italy and the Republic of Ireland), then because from the start we were concentrating on our first game against Ireland, so therefore we try to find similar things in the way of play or style of football and mentality or philosophy, everything. We've chosen Estonia and of course Norway. We played Estonia and we played a good game, we beat them, and tomorrow as I told you... ok, on the one hand it's a preparation game, the players are going to definitely think maybe ten per cent not to get injured, but in a positive way, but because of the Euros, because it's there in a week's time... and it has to show us not maybe in what condition we're going to be (in) when we face Ireland, but after these two weeks of really hard training, where we are standing now, one week before the Euros and that is very important."