Modrić was just six years old when the Croatian War of Independence reached his hometown of Zadar, Croatia, where he was born on September 9, 1985. Before the violence forced them to leave, his family resided in a village in Modriň, which is close to Zadar. One of the darkest moments of his childhood came when his grandfather, Luka Modrić Sr., was assassinated by Serbian rebel forces in December 1991 while looking after goats close to the family’s home.
