Photographer Tackled By Celebrating Croatian Players Got Incredible Photos, Kisses

During yesterday’s World Cup semifinal game between England and Croatia, a sideline photographer for Agence France-Press, Yuri Cortez, found himself at the bottom of a Croatian team dog pile after the got knocked over during Croatia’s celebrations for Mario Mandzukic’s extra-time, game-winning goal. The extremely professional Cortez continued to shoot and the results might be the best photos of the tournament:

Cortez was standing by the corner flag when Mandzukic scored in the 109th minute.

At the 23-second mark you can see a grinning Cortez on the ground under a thicket of Croatian players, with this camera in the air; at the 40-second mark, Cortez gets a big ol’ kiss from Domagoj Vida; and just after that a concerned-looking Ivan Rakitic appears to ask him if he’s okay. He was just fine.