Šimunić was educated at the
Australian Institute of Sport (AIS). He was eligible to play for
Australia but opted to play for
Croatia. After obtaining dual citizenship in October 2001, he made his international debut in Croatia's friendly match against
South Korea on 10 November 2001. He did not play in any of Croatia's
qualifiers for the
2002 World Cup, but was given a place in the
squad for the finals after an injury forced
Igor Tudor out. Šimunić played all three of Croatia's matches in South Korea and Japan. He also played at the
2004 Euros, the
2006 World Cup and the
2008 Euros, performing well in the latter tournament. In a well-publicised incident, Šimunić was sent off in Croatia's final 2006 World Cup match against Australia. Having picked up his first booking in the 61st minute, he was given a second yellow card by English referee
Graham Poll for his tackle in the 90th minute. Poll committed a rarely seen blunder and forgot to dismiss Šimunić from the pitch. Three minutes later, at the very conclusion of the match, Šimunić remonstrated with Poll and received a "third" yellow card, this time followed by a red card.
FIFA initially noted all three bookings in its match report, before later removing the 90th minute (second) booking. This prompted the removal of Poll from the referee pool for the
knockout stages of the tournament. Shortly after the World Cup, Poll retired from refereeing international games, citing this game as a direct cause. Upon the release of his autobiography in 2007, Poll revealed that upon booking Šimunić for the second time, he had erroneously recorded him as "Australia #3" (who was defender
Craig Moore), due to Šimunić's Australian accent. Šimunić was known for great football technique, despite having been a centre-half. His national teammate
Niko Kranjčar had said of him, "In training, he does feints like
Ronaldinho."
Fascist salute controversy Šimunić was involved in a controversy following a 2–0 win for Croatia against
Iceland in
Zagreb on 19 November 2013. He was accused of
fascist sympathies for having directed the crowd in a chant following the game. The use of the salute "
Za dom!" (
For [the] homeland!), with the fans responding "
Spremni!" (
Ready!), was identical to the salute used by the fascist
Ustaše movement in
Croatia during World War II. He defended his actions saying that he was driven by "love for his Croatian homeland". After the match, Šimunić responded to his critics: "Those who are bothered by those shouts should study
history. If it bothers someone, then it's their problem. I'm not afraid." For this incident, Šimunić was fined 25,000
kunas (around €3,270) by the
State's Attorney Office of Croatia for
inciting racial hatred and harassment of other participants of a public gathering. After an investigation FIFA suspended Šimunić for ten official matches, banned him from entering the confines of the stadiums for those ten matches and imposed a fine of
CHF 30,000 (around €24,000). Šimunić's behaviour was denounced by the
Croatian Minister of Science, Education and Sports Željko Jovanović, the Association of Anti-Fascist Fighters of Croatia (SABH) and various foreign and domestic media. Others, such as the
Croatian Football Federation and national team coach
Niko Kovač, have described the suspension as excessive and draconian. Šimunić appealed to rescind his suspension, but lost his appeal with FIFA in March 2014, and with the
Court of Arbitration for Sport in May 2014. In 2019, Šimunić stated on
Sportske novosti: "I wasn't aware of the implications because I hadn't lived in Croatia for a long period of time and I hadn't felt such a division about certain questions, even if they were
Za dom spremni. So, to be very clear, I was not glorifying fascism,
Nazism, or any other kind of
totalitarianism. I was glorifying Croatia. I was convinced that was the right way. Today I understand there is a lot of those who think that is the wrong way." and "Being aware of the context and everything that had happened, today I would chant 'Croatia, Croatia'". ==Post-playing career==