Griezmann is the clearest danger to Portugal, with his six-goal tally at Euro 2016 double that of any player, including Cristiano Ronaldo, who has three.
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After his goalscoring display in the Euro 2016 semi-final win over Wales, Ronaldo is ready to spearhead Portugal’s first-ever triumph in a major tournament and Deschamps said: “If there is an anti-Ronaldo plan, no one has yet found the recipe”.
I backed France before the tournament but I just don’t see this match being as straightforward for them as everyone thinks.
As well as reaching that Euro 2004 final, they also lost out in the World Cup semi-final in 2006, the quarter-finals at Euro 2008 and the semi-finals at Euro 2012.
The countdown to the final has begun and with a few hours left to the concluding clash, Ronaldo will be hoping to have tears of joy after the final whistle rather than a repeat of the 2004 story.
Nevertheless, the 1998 World Cup and Euro 2000-winning captain stated he would have no qualms over switching his star man once more if a dogged Portugal prove tough to break down in Saint-Denis.
“We’ve had two years of friendly matches (because France, as hosts, did not have to qualify)”.
And that’s because Portugal are quite simply the greatest overachievers in worldwide football. Having been voted the World-Player-of-the-Year three times, Ronaldo needs this win to consolidate his position among his peers of the modern era. “The whole country is going to support them, but. we’re going to be hard to beat”. They got the tournament underway with a 2-1 win against Romania in the opening game before defeating Albania and then drawing with Switzerland to qualify as group winners.
How they got here: Both teams managed 2-0 victories over their respective semifinal opponents.
Ronaldo has only scored in two of Portugal’s six games in France, and yet he is only one goal away from scoring a 10th European Championship goal and breaking Michel Platini’s 32-year record.
The hosts had more of the chances but just couldn’t finish, while Portugal just needed that one struck of genius to conquer the continent.
This is for the second time Portugal have made it to the final of the European championship.
Where can you watch the Euro 2016 final?
Antoine Griezmann has been France’s talismanic forward at the tournament so far. Good goals may result from the final match between Portugal and France tomorrow and if that does happen, we’ll make sure to add them here. So far, almost all the teams they’ve played have sat back – even Croatia didn’t really have a go at them. “But the France players are playing at home and they’re very experienced”, Santos told reporters at the Stade de France on Saturday.
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“Now we are in the final again and we hope we will win it”.
