England captain John Terry says they must hit Croatia hard in the opening exchanges of their World Cup qualifier at Wembley.
The Chelsea defender explained: "I think the importance of that first 10-15 minutes cannot be over-stressed.
"From a personal point of view, the last game in Zagreb was very physical. They set the tone of the game early on. That is what we need to do.
"I think for the first 15 minutes we need to be aggressive and match them. When the ball does get down and we start playing I think we've seen we can match a lot of the teams in the world.
"But physically, as we do at Chelsea, you go out to win your battles early on. That's key; that can set the tone of the game."
The circumstances of the tie will have a major bearing on tactics, Terry points out.
"They have to win, so we have to make sure we are organised and very patient as well and soak up a lot of the pressure they are going to try and pile on early on - which they did over there," he added.
"If we can do that, with the quality we have got going forward, we can always score goals."
