Portugal beats Croatia 1-0 at European Championship

LENS, France Croatia coach Ante Cacic lamented his fancied side’s failure to score against bogey team Portugal in their 1-0 Euro 2016 last 16 defeat on Saturday as Ricardo Quaresma’s extra time header sent them out.

After Ivan Perisic was unlucky to see a header come back off a post, the closest by far the game had come to a goal in nearly two hours of football, Sanches was instrumental in turning defence into attack straight away, carrying the ball across the halfway line before Croatia fully realised the danger and finding Nani in the area. Substitute Ricardo Quaresma’s glorious sense of timing and positioning after Cristiano Ronaldo’s saved effort would have been a huge shot in the arm for Santos.

Portugal then snatched their first victory of the tournament at the death as Quaresma was perfectly positioned to head in after Ronaldo’s low shot was parried away by goalkeeper Danijel Subasic.

With barely minutes to go in its round of 16-match against Croatia at the European Championship on Saturday, Portugal conjured a victor from its first really penetrating attack.

It’s a lesson they’ll need to take into Thursday’s quarterfinal meeting with Portugal in Marseille.

The match turned on 30 seconds in the dying moments as Perisic headed against the upright and Portugal launched an attack up field.

Star midfielder Luka Modric returned from injury for a matchup with his Real Madrid teammate Ronaldo, but both he and Barcelona’s Ivan Rakitic struggled to sparkle as they had earlier in the tournament. “We played good the whole tournament and didn’t deserve to be out”, he said.

Still, after being so prolific in the group stage – Ronaldo’s 32 goal attempts had been more than eight team totals, including Italy’s – his first attempt in Lens helped Portugal into the last eight.

Their best chances fell to the impressive defender Domagoj Vida. The Poles went a flawless five from five from the spot. “For the fans and the analysts and the pundits, sometimes we’d like to play pretty, but that’s not always how you win tournaments”.

“Everything was ideal except we didn’t score”, Cacic told reporters, “so we weren’t successful in attack”. “But the team as a whole worked incredibly well, and we spoke before the game about moving the ball, making them exhausted and ultimately they would make mistakes”.

It was a very tactical match.

“I can only congratulate my players”.

The game finished scoreless and went into extra time with Nikola Kalinic, who replaced Mandzukic, blasting a shot wide halfway through the first period.

Not much came of Croatia’s initial possessional superiority, however, whereas what little Ronaldo saw of the ball he was able to put to effective use.

“The Swiss are world-class in defence and attack”, Poland manager Adam Nawalka said. We deserved the win more than them.

That, in short, is the game that many teams have brought to France this month.

With Lewandowski drawing another Euro blank at Saint-Etienne’s Stade Geoffrey Guichard, Jakub Blaszczykowski scored the crucial opening goal for Poland but Switzerland drew level in spectacular style through Shaqiri.