Cristiano Ronaldo hails Portugal qualification after ‘crazy’ Hungary draw

But Portugal equalized three minutes before half time when Nani fired a powerful left-footed strike into the bottom corner after a through ball from Ronaldo.

“This I’m sure increased his confidence levels”, Santos said. We had two great performances in our other games as well but we promised we’d score against Hungary and we have got three so I am very pleased.

4 goals in just over 15 minutes at the start of the second half saw Hungary regain the lead, draw, then regain the lead before being pegged back again.

The Irish, Belgians, Iceland and Portugal join hosts France, Wales, Germany, Croatia, Italy, Switzerland, England, Poland, Spain, Slovakia, Northern Ireland and Hungary in the last 16.

“It was an insane match”, said Ronaldo as Portugal equalized three times in sweltering conditions.

“We had a very good history in the 1950s and 60s but this is a bygone era and I want to talk about this team who earned their berth in the Euro 2016 knockout stages”.

Northern Ireland now knows it will play group victor Wales in a British derby match in Paris on Saturday.

This latest controversy comes in the aftermath of the forward throwing a television presenter’s microphone into a lake during a pre-match walk on Wednesday.

Hungary were lethal in attack; Portugal were leaky in defence but it was the class of Christiano Ronaldo that made the difference for the Portuguese side who now have a tall order against a disciplined Croatian side who beat the defending champions Spain.

The second record came for Ronaldo when he delivered a brilliant back-heel flick against Hungary to become the first player to score at four European Championship tournaments.

Portugal star Cristiano Ronaldo took umbrage at Iceland’s tactics and claimed they had a “small mentality” following their opening 1-1 Group F draw.

“We played good match”, he said.

Croatia and Portugal face off in the round of 16 of this year’s European Championship.

Dzsudzsak struck again five minutes later with a shot that grazed Nani before looping over goalkeeper Rui Patricio to restore the lead at 3-2.

It was 12 minutes of soccer bliss, mainly courtesy of Cristiano Ronaldo, and now we thankfully get to see him try to make some more.

“I think over the three matches we played more than enough to finish in first place”, said Santos.

“They were just defend, defend, defend and playing on the counterattack”.