In the final last-16 fixture of this year’s World Cup, Portugal ran out 6-1 winners against a sorry Switzerland side at the Lusail Iconic Stadium. After a mixed bag of results in the group stages, Fernando Santos’ men have now well and truly arrived at the World Cup and have put their marker down.
Switzerland were a shadow of the side we saw against Serbia and looked timid and unsure throughout. Despite Manuel Akanji tapping in a consolation goal for Murat Yakin’s side mid way through the second half, the game as a contest was already done and dusted.
Portugal now have a quarter-final tie against Morocco to look forward to, after the African outfit stunned Spain in a penalty shootout win earlier in the day.
No Ronaldo, no problem
The big news pre-match was the decision made by Fernando Santos to leave out living legend, Cristiano Ronaldo. The five-time Ballon d’Or winner has enjoyed a disappointing World Cup and reacted unfavourably to being subbed off in their final group game against South Korea.
In the press conference yesterday, Santos hinted that he could leave his talisman out of the starting eleven but nobody really thought he would. However, with a couple of hours to go until kick-off, news started to leak out from the Portuguese camp that he had indeed been dropped in favour of Goncalo Ramos.
Ramos, who plays his club football for Benfica, more than took his chance. He opened the scoring in the 17th minute with a rocket off his left foot that beat Switzerland goalkeeper, Sommer, for sheer pace at his near post.
After stand-in captain, Pepe, doubled Portugal’s lead with a thumping header, Ramos added his second of the night after a near post dart to get on the end of a Diogo Dalot cross shortly after half-time.
Goals galore
With the game all but over in the 48th minute, Portugal could have chosen to relax and see the game but instead, they went for the Swiss jugular and piled more misery on their opponents.
Guerreiro topped off a lovely sweeping move to add the fourth before Gomes got his well well-deserved hat trick in the 67th minute with a delightful dinked finish over Sommer from a one-on-one position.
Just five minutes later, he was replaced by Cristiano Ronaldo who clearly deemed that 17 minutes was worth his time. Earlier this season, Ronaldo refused to come off the bench for the final five minutes in a game for Manchester United.
Not long after, Ronaldo thought he’d added a sixth goal for his side but it was ruled out for offside. The replay showed that Ronaldo was so far offside that he may as well have been back in Manchester.
A wonderful evening for Santos and his side was topped off in stoppage time when Rafael Leão made it 6-1 with a curling effort that looped over Sommer’s head. The Swiss goalkeeper had a miserable evening, but in truth, he can’t be blamed for any of the Portugal goals.
Portugal, and the other remaining seven nations, now get a couple of days off. The quarter-finals begin on Friday with Portugal’s clash with Morocco pencilled in for Saturday afternoon.
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