Topic: ⚽ UEFA Euro 2024 in Germany ⚽ - Qualifiers - page 104. (Read 46401 times)

The hero of the match is Diogo Costa, the goalkeeper of Portugal. He made 3 saves in penalty shootouts and helped Portugal win there but before that, he made a golden save in 115 minute, in the second extra half. He saved Ronaldo and Pepe in this match, and we saw how Pepe reacted like "Thank God, Diogo Costa saved me" after he made a terrible mistake and gave Slovenia a great chance to finalize the match.

Joao Cancelo had a good match and made some good passes too but other team mates could not convert those chances to goal. Joao Cancelo made a personal mistake in a first extra half but severity is less than the one from Pepe.

Slovenia played defensively and Portugal controlled the match, created opportunities but Oblak played well for Slovenia. After all, Portugal deserved this winning and they will play a quarter final match with France.

One of the most interesting matches was between Portugal vs Slovenia, as both teams attacked a lot and the match ended in a draw in the last stages. Both teams then played till the last moment but could not score any goals, then the match went to penalties, actually penalties depend on the luck of each team. We had a bit of luck against Portugal in some matches, which led to them winning on penalties and qualifying for the quarter-finals. Slovenia's luck may not have been on their side as they came close to winning but lost and were forced out of the Euro Cup, a tough one for them. However, the match was more aggressive in all aspects, with both teams playing well and Portugal qualifying for the next round. However, Portugal's next match against France certainly looks to be more of a threat for Portugal.

It was really interesting, in the Portugal vs Slovenia match. Portugal, who dominated this match, had a very difficult time penetrating Slovenia's strong defense line, i am sure Slovenia applied all-out defense in this match. And, another interesting about this match is Portugal managed to get so many opportunities from free kicks, but Cristiano Ronaldo failed to score a goal on these occasions.

From the start to the end of the match, Slovenia was so strong in defense, they only had a few serious threats from Portugal, however, several times Slovenia managed to get into Portugal's defense line and get their shots on target, but unfortunately the shots from the Slovenian players were not so focused and deviated, so that they had difficulty producing a goal, even until the end of extra time. Finally, Portugal managed to beat Slovenia on penalties, Diogo Costa as Portugal's goalkeeper managed to bring Portugal to victory with his neat saves in this match. Congratulations to Portugal for successfully qualifying for the quarter-finals.

It hurts if your last few moments with your national team are filled with disappointment, especially when your generation is called the golden generation. On the other hand, it's not the first time a team full of good players failed to go far with their national team. I can understand their frustration, especially when everything feels like it goes against your way (ruled-out goal, offside, own goal, etc)[1]. If I were their coach I'd be frustrated too.

[1] https://sports.yahoo.com/belgiums-tedesco-analyse-frustating-euros-204823574.html

The OG comes at a time when Belgium nearly can not do anything to find a goal to pull the match back. The shot of Kolo Muani will be saved if it does not hit the knee of Vertonghen in that situation. It's like destiny for Belgium in Euro 2024 but in general they did not play well in this Euro. Losing this way, with an OG is painful but it's hard for Belgium to go far with players they have and with performances they shown this summer.

These Belgium players know that they nearly played a last big tournament for their national team because they are losing their positions in club and will face with competitions from younger players or they will retire soon. Hazard already retired and we are counting down time till similar days for Lukaku, De Bruyne and Vertonghen.

France in this Euro are not doing well, I put my bets on France beating Poland in the group stage using Crown88, somehow ended up with disappointment.

France and Portugal managed to win the match and advance to the quarter-finals, France had to fight until the 85th minute to get an own goal yeah we know it's not just luck because there is more effort with 19 shots. In other matches, Portugal also won the match on penalties as we expected Portugal did it with great difficulty well, 2 other teams have taken their place in the quarter finals and we are waiting for 2 other teams to also take their place there Netherland and Turkey are my favorites or will we see another surprise there?

I wonder how Portugal could continue like that. They lost against Georgia which was knocked by Spain by 4 goals. They got a draw vs Slovenia and luckily they weren't ready for penalties and failed badly, otherwise Portugal will be in trouble.
Next match will be vs France. That Quarter-final game will be the last for Cristiano Ronaldo since I doubt they could stand against France even though I have many critics on the way the French team play.

Slovenia played really well, amazingly well but sadly, wasn’t able to do nothing in the penalties. Oblak extended their time to look for a win in extra time by providing that massive save from Ronaldo’s spot kick but, it only lasted for the extra time. You could see how furious Ronaldo was and had to apologize to the Portugal fans even when he scored his second penalty in the game. It was a close one yet, the side netting did it for him as Oblak followed it through and through.
Unfortunately, the Slovenia players proved not to have been penalty qualified or prepared. Took 3 shots from the spot and not a single one found itself to the net. The genius goalkeeper Diogo Costa should be commended on this one. Making 3 consecutive straight saves from the spot in the first spot kick at this stage of the Euros. That was nothing but quality goalkeeping and he was very decisive all through.

E glad only narrowly managed to win, all thanks to Jude Bellingham for scoring that equalizer and they managed to go ahead and win the game afterwards with yet another goal.

These smaller teams that manage to qualify only have one agenda, is to frustrate the bigger teams who are eying the trophy and it pains me to see the likes of England struggling with Slovakia, Italy playing poorly against a team they would beat hands down as of last Euros when they won it, talking of Switzerland and now we see Portugal crying to even get a goal in the first half and it went on to be goalless till full time, even at extra time the big boss missed a penalty and they were frustrated by a smaller team in the round of 16.
Slovenia did good by holding Portugal to a draw, I wasn't expecting it to be this way and I said this encounter is one that Portugal will score more goals like Spain did in their game against Georgia, it never happened and I'll continue to say it that Portugal will always perform poorly as long as they have Ronaldo on the pitch.
I won't say Portugal are going to survive the next game just because they're Portugal with good players, no, it will be another battle for them and it might be their last in this tournament. Portugal against France is going to be a game France will play out their best because I don't think Portugal have anything special to produce with Ronaldo on the squad, let's forget the game France had against Belgium, it won't be that way against Portugal on Friday and is France advancing to the semis.

Slovenia for a moment weren’t looking like a country that were regarded as the underdog. They defended so casually and build the game from the defense just like other elites teams will do. They were very good in the midfield and that was what actually made Portugal more frustrated. The game was just a show of a world class goalkeeper leaving the game in high and another young goalkeeper bursting to the scene.
I feel the win is seriously a good one and a redemption for Ronaldo, had the game not ended this way he would have suffered from this all his life

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England are just favorites because of the section that they are. People think they would freely ride to the title but with their game against Slovakia and how Switzerland dominated Italy I will say I fancy Switzerland going through to the semi finals

Aside from the fact that Ronaldo missed the earlier penalty to seal their win, which made him cry while it was quite understanding for him to express his grievance but I think his teammates seeing him cry was something that affected their concentration more.
I hope he try to control his emotions more in public which has been one of his biggest issues.

Costa stole the spot light from Oblak who still did well also and I think France will want to avoid facing penalty shootout against Portugal.

Slovenia holding Portugal till penalty shootout is nothing they'll be ashamed of , I expect them to go home with their heads high because they played we today even against disadvantage of prayers qualities.

Yes, France was very lucky this time, very lucky, because thanks to OG by Vertonghen, they were finally able to win the match and advance to QF. It was the only goal scored in the match, and it's OG. In fact, France had a lot of opportunities to invade, so they even continuously attacked Belgium. However, Belgium was still able to break their attack very well. This time, their defenders really played very effectively, so that France was only able to take 2 shots on target and all of them were saved.

Belgium in this case must be very sorry, especially Vertonghen, of course, because of his OG, they had to lose badly and go home with that defeat. Look at how sad the expressions of Vertonghen, de Bruyne and Lukaku were, after the OG.

You have to feel sorry for Slovenia. They defended themselves really well, and it looked like that penalty saved by Oblak would give them a massive psychological advantage, but nope, they got outclassed in the shootout.
I'm glad Christiano Ronaldo managed to redeem himself. It's probably his last international tournament, so if they were to drop off because of that missed penalty, that would be devastating for him.

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Current odds after tonight's round:



England is the favourite, but that's largely due to them having Switzerland as the opponent in the quarter-final, which is considered one of the weakest team in the bunch.
My first pick is Spain, followed by Portugal.

Right from the onset it was a game between the favorites and a team that haven't lost a game in a while. From minute 1 Portugal played better, but Slovenia defense stood strong and resolute

It was ATTACK vs DEFENSE. Leao was the best player first half, but during the second Half Cancelo was doing the "modern full back" thing, and then Costa saved the day.

Slovenia on the other hand didn't mind, just stand your ground. A typical 4-4-2 brought back in the modern game. The just wanted to take there chances, Sesko had there two best chances but missed

In the end,the team that played better,won the game.

I'm accepting that England played terrible. However I think other favourites also played very badly in the tournament except Spain and Germany. Therefore I started to think that England still have a serious chance to win the tournament. Portugal would say goodbye to the tournament in last 16 today if it weren't for their goalkeeper Diogo Costa's amazing performance.

It is undeniable that in today's match Diogo Costa was the most important pillar that brought Portugal through to the next phase.

After Ronaldo's missed penalty in extra time we could see that Portugal started to suffer from a mental and concentration decline that made them seem to lose their soul in playing, it was evident when Pepe made a mistake which fortunately Costa was still alert enough to secure the Portuguese goal from conceding the ball.
Costa's moment was a little hopeful and in the shootout Costa gave a big hope with 3 brilliant saves he made which made Portugal, especially for Ronaldo, avoid too much criticism because I think if in the end Portugal lost this match then Ronaldo would get a lot of criticism because of his penalty failure.

In addition, in this match actually both goalkeepers played very well and Oblak could be the MOTM but when Costa managed to make 3 consecutive saves then indeed Costa was the MOTM in today's match but Oblak and Slovenian players also performed worthy of appreciation because they could concentrate until the end of the match it was worthy of praise.

Diogo Costa is the man that have saved Portugal for the next phase of the competition. the two Portugal Legends Cristiano Ronaldo and Pepe nearly cost them the day with their mistakes, first it was Ronaldo that missed a penalty kick during the regular playing time and he couldn't hold back his emotions as he was crying bitterly after the miss, though he was able to redeem himself during the 5-5 penalty kick from Both side, Then Pepe too made a mistake that almost cost Portugal a goal but Diogo Costa still saved it.

I haven't seen a game this tensed and full of drama in this Euro 2024 competition like this one, Oblack penalty save really made Slovenia players to push on till the final whistle, to a large extent I really would want to give credit to Slovenia for coming this far and facing a tougher team that ordinary they could have lost to on regular time.

It’s been an incredible duo between these two Portugal vs Slovenia. I would say Slovenia had a good game from the way they managed the game, seating back and making those long passes forward to give Sesko a chance to engage Pepe and have his chance with Diogo Costa. The game had over 5 odds on it for a draw across all bookies and the underestimation of Slovenia gave them almost 9 odds to win going into the game which one could have easily gotten a good off multiplier from a double chance 2x market.

Both teams had a best chance in the extra time, with Ronaldo missing a crucial penalty that could have meant game over for Slovenia and Sesko missing the chance to net a goal from Pepe’s misjudged pass. I must commend Diogo Costa on that one. Came out of his post, made himself bigger and saved that Portugal. His all that would be talked about in this fixture.

I laughed at myself, because it didn't meet expectations and it turned out that Diogo Costa, the goalkeeper from Portugal, was better than Jan Oblak, the goalkeeper from Slovenia.
Diogo Costa was able to parry all of the Slovenian players' kicks and Portugal won the match and progressed to the next round.