Croatia regret missed opportunity after late Portugal win

The Dynamo Kiev centre-back twice went close with headers and nearly took the match to penalties with another effort. “You have given us a sense of togetherness, belonging and pride of playing for Croatia than words can’t describe”.

“The main thing is to be in the quarter-finals and it doesn’t matter if you play handsome football or if you’re playing ugly football, you have to win”. A miss by Arsenal midfielder Granit Xhaka for Switzerland’s side decided the game in favor of the White and Reds.

He did, however, name Ronaldo’s team as favorites to reach the July 10 final in Paris.

Gareth Bale had a lovely chance to score his fourth goal but his teasing free kick was collected early in the second half.

When he was appointed as national manager, Ante Cacic was the target of critics who thought that he is not good enough for the job.

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The Welsh will surely have to pose more of an attacking danger against either Hungary or Belgium in the quarterfinals on Saturday.

In a boring affair between Portugal and Croatia.

Instead they got to see two hours of cagey, nervy football with only one shot on target amid some shocking finishing until the mercurial Ricardo Quaresma lit up the stadium with his victor three minutes from the end of extra time.

Croatia still looked livelier and Vida was frustrated again as he headed another corner just over with Portugal keeper Rui Patricio stranded after coming out for the cross. He waited until the last minute of the regulation to give a chance to Fiorentina striker Nikola Kalinic who had a pivotal role in a victory against Spain, scoring an equalizer and setting up position for Ivan Perisic to score a winning goal in that match.

Substitute Ricardo Quaresma scored the sole goal in the match in the 117th minute with Portugal’s only serious attack.

At Saint-Etienne’s Stade Geoffrey Guichard, Blaszczykowski opened the scoring for Poland but Switzerland drew level in spectacular style with Xherdan Shaqiri’s bicycle kick, a potential goal of the tournament.

The Poles scored all five penalties, rounded off by Grzegorz Krychowiak’s emphatic finish which put his nation into the quarter-finals of a major tournament for the first time since the 1982 World Cup.

Speaking at the pre-match press conference ahead of Thursday’s tie with Poland, the Fenerbache star said: “We have shown camaraderie and that we are all rowing in the same direction”.

Fortunately, yesterday morning, I got to watch the replay of Wales vs. Northern Island with the one who dictates my time, my son, and boy, what a game it was. “My God I am happy!”

That earned France a match against Ireland in the round of 16 exactly one week later.

“Preparing for this match, we tried to improve our penalties, and we knew they’d be taken in the best possible way”, Poland coach Adam Nawalka said through a translator.