Croatia's legendary football coach Miroslav Blazevic dies at 87

Croatia's famed football coach Miroslav Blazevic -- who led the country to a third-place finish at the 1998 World Cup -- died, the national football federation said. He was 87.

"The whole football family has lost 'the coach of all coaches' today," the federation wrote on social media.

Blazevic died in the capital Zagreb after a long fight with cancer, spurring a flood of condolences.

Born on February 10, 1935, Blazevic started his playing career in his hometown of Travnik in neighbouring Bosnia.

In the early 1960s, he began coaching in Switzerland and moved in 1979 to Croatia, which was then part of the former Yugoslavia.

In Croatia, he coached Rijeka and later Dinamo Zagreb, where he led the club to their first Yugoslav championship in 24 years.

After winning the title, Blazevic's popularity soared at home where he was known for wearing fashionable white scarves in public.

From 1994 to 2000, Blazevic took the helm of the national team and racked up a number of impressive wins, including a third-place finish at the 1998 World Cup in France.

The finish provided a much-needed boost to the weary nation following years of fighting during Croatia's 1991-1995 independence war amid the bloody break-up of Yugoslavia.