Ronaldo return to form gives Portugal timely boost

Although the media shouted questions towards the star after his brief statement, Ronaldo simply said that it was a decision down to Portugal’s media officer: “It’s not up to me”, he said.

The history between two teams is one more concern for Croatia, as Portugal has won all three previous encounters, and Croats did not score a single goal in those matches.

“We have good players, a good coach in Fernando Santos and we need to believe in ourselves”.

“This, I am sure, increased his confidence levels”, Santos said.

Luka Modric could return to the Croatia first-team on Saturday after missing his side’s victory over Spain, while Nikola Kalinic’s strike against the holders will put pressure on boss Ante Cacic to leave out Juventus striker Mario Mandzukic.

Ronaldo opened his account in style with a deft backheel flick on 50 minutes before a bullet header 12 minutes later to twice equalize at the Stade de Lyon.

Hungary led three times, but were pegged back by a Ronaldo-inspired Portugal side who went through as one of the best third-placed finishers.

“It’s hard to say who is the favourite team, you can only say that third place didn’t show how Portugal were playing. 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”.

Croatia topped Group D, helping Portugal avoid a meeting with Iberian rivals Spain, yet Santos was quick to reject talk that they now have an easier tie.

“But we were in the hardest group of the tournament and we managed to progress”. We said we wanted to win this competition.

Iceland’s winning goal in stoppage-time against Austria wrote another chapter of the tournament’s feel-good story and set up a round of 16 clash with England.

Group F saw Hungary take on Portugal in what was a thrilling and sensational game with six goals in total.

But Portugal’s defence, marshalled by Pepe, looked less than solid in what was an obvious cause for concern for the manager.

“We hadn’t been able to score and we weren’t convincing up front. We travelled to France on the same plane with the players and will fly back with them”, the reporter concluded.

“So Cristiano is better when in a position where he can attack the defence and the goal. He is a unsafe player, and you can’t always control him”, Hungary coach Bernd Storck said.