Local media yesterday broadcast footage of Australian-born Simunic taking over a microphone after the match at Zagreb’s Maksimir Stadium and shouting four times “For the Homeland” (Za Dom) while the fans chanted back “Ready” (Spremni).

The chant was used by Croatia’s pro-Nazi Ustasha regime which killed hundreds of thousands of Serbs, Jews, anti-fascist Croatians, Roma and others in concentration camps during World War II.

Simunic argued that he had been motivated “purely by (his) love for the (Croatian) people and the homeland”.u00a0