Although he was unable to score at the Do Dragao stadium, Cristiano Ronaldo is, at 37, closer to his fifth World Cup, after Portugal qualified this Thursday for the final of Route C of the European play-offs for Qatar 2022 with a 3-1 win against Turkey. Portugal’s rival on Tuesday in the final will be North Macedonia, which gave the big surprise by eliminating Italy, European champion and who will miss their second World Cup in a row, after Russia 2018, by 0-1.
Portugal: Diogo Costa, Fonte, Guerreiro (Nuno Mendes, 88′), Danilo Pereira, Dalot, Otavio (Leao, 88′), Moutinho (Matheus Nunes, 88′), Bernardo Silva, Bruno Fernandes (William Carvalho, 80′) , Cristiano Ronaldo, Diogo Jota (Joao Félix, 71′)
Turquía: Cakir, Soyuncu, Ozan Kabak, Demiral, Akturkoglu (Enes Unal, 66′), Kutlu (Dursun, 90′), Çelik (Yazici, 80′), Orkun Kökcü (Tokoz, 80′), Çalhanoglu, Burak Yilmaz y under.
Goals: 1-0, Otavio (15′); 2-0, Diogo Jota (42′); 2-1, Yilmaz (65′); 3-1. Matheus Nunes (93′)
Referee: Daniel Siebert (Germany). He booked Diogo Jota, Otavio and João Moutinho for Portugal and the Turks Zeki Çelik, Calhanoglu and Demiral.
Incidents: Semifinal of the European group playoff for the Qatar 2022 World Cup qualification, played at the Estadio do Dragao in Porto
see game file
The Portuguese team began practicing a great game, creating good chances, which had its reward in Otavio’s goal. He arrived in the 15th minute, after a good play by the Portuguese, and, after the ball hit the post, Porto’s interior took advantage of the rebound to score.
Then the Turkish team, led by the German Stefan Kuntz, went further against a Portugal that went through a bad time. CR7 could not take advantage of what was his third chance of the night. But Turkey’s improvement did not serve to level the score.
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And the Portuguese machine worked again. Diogo Jota made it 2-0 on the scoreboard after some good play by his team, with Cristiano Ronaldo and Otavio leading the way, who assisted the Liverpool winger. Jota scored with a header. It was 42′.
But Turkey managed to get into the match in the second half, as Burak Yilmaz pulled one back after a good combination from Cengiz Under. The Lille striker beat Diogo Costa with his left foot in the 65th minute, whom, by surprise, he chose as the starter after the injury of Anthony Lopes and instead of Rui Patricio.
Portugal continued to have chances, such as the one starring Joao Felix, who came on in the 71st minute replacing Diogo Jota. But Fernando Santos’ men lacked accuracy and fear took hold of the fans at the Do Dragao stadium when the referee, after reviewing the play through VAR, pointed out a penalty by José Fonte on Enes Yunal. Only that Burak Yilmaz missed the maximum penalty by throwing the ball high.
Diogo Jota celebrates his goal
Matheus Luiz rounded off the 3-1 for Portugal in stoppage time after a great play by Milan player Leao. The Turkish dream was over. Cristiano Ronaldo crashed the ball into the crossbar. It was not his night in front of goal, but Portugal is in the final, his last step before the World Cup.