(Football news) Roberto Martinez’s men dramatically bested a plucky Slovenia side on penalties to prolong their quest for glory, while Les Bleus were also far from convincing in their 1-0 beating of Belgium.
Monday’s Deutsche Bank Park battle between Portugal and Slovenia was one of tragedy and triumph for Selecao superstar Ronaldo, whose attempts to score a goal at Euro 2024 remain fruitless, thanks in no small part to Jan Oblak’s heroic extra-time penalty save from the 39-year-old.
Tears flowed from Ronaldo’s face before Slovenia kept Martinez’s men off the scoresheet for the final 15 minutes of the 120, but as the Al-Nassr man, Bernardo Silva and Bruno Fernandes all registered from 12 yards, the Slovenians met an impenetrable wall in Diogo Costa.
Replacing Ronaldo as Portugal’s hero for the evening, Costa became the first male goalkeeper to ever save three penalties in a European Championship shootout to propel the 2016 champions into the quarter-finals, sparing the blushes of his teammates who were repelled time and time again by Matjaz Kek’s valiant troops.
However, having come up trumps from the penalty spot, Portugal will now compete in their seventh European Championship quarter-final – more than any other men’s nation since 1996 – and their only two losses at this stage so far have come against the Czech Republic in that year and to eventual runners-up Germany in 2008.
Already going one better than their agonising last-16 exit at the delayed Euro 2020, Portugal will be rewarded with an equally daunting semi-final against either Spain or Germany should they conquer the French in Hamburg, but their shooting boots have abandoned them at the most inopportune time.
Indeed, Martinez’s men have now gone scoreless in their last two Euro 2024 ties – having also been shocked 2-0 by Georgia’s history-makers in their final Group F encounter – but their upcoming foes have not exactly hit the lofty attacking heights expected of them either.
Four matches into the current European Championships, and a French player is yet to score a goal through open play, but the fact of the matter is that Didier Deschamps’s men are quarter-finalists once again, banishing the demons of their Euro 2020 dejection.
On the back of their underwhelming group-stage display – where their only goals came via Austria defender Maximilian Wober and a Kylian Mbappe penalty – France pitted their wits against a Belgium side with a blend of youthful talent and the so-called ‘golden generation’, and it was a member of the latter that decided both teams’ destiny.
A beleaguered Belgium unit had kept the 2018 world champions at arm’s length for 85 minutes, until Randal Kolo Muani’s effort took a wicked deflection off of Jan Vertonghen, condemning the Red Devils to more major tournament misery in Dusseldorf.
For all of Les Bleus’ rather pitiful attacking play, Deschamps ought to have taken pride from another exceptional defensive performance as France kept their third clean sheet in four Euro 2024 matches, and Robert Lewandowski’s penalty for Poland is the only goal that Les Bleus have conceded in their last six.
With France also failing to make the net bulge in their final Euro 2024 warm-up match versus Canada, though, Les Bleus are on their worst run of not scoring from open play since an identical run of five games from March to September 2013, during Deschamps’s earlier years at the helm.
While Ronaldo’s head-to-head versus Mbappe will steal the pre-game headlines, a less revered striker in Eder memorably conjured up the solitary goal in Portugal’s historic Euro 2016 final triumph over France, although that represents the Selecao’s only win from their last 13 against Les Bleus, whom they drew 2-2 with in the 2021 group phase in a game of three penalties.
Also read: Spain will play Germany in the quarter finals of the Euro 2024
