Tears of Luka Modric and his teammates seen after the final whistle in a match against Portugal which ended Croatian dream of achieving something great at 2016 EURO in France will stick in minds of Croatian supporters for some time.
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Portugal’s forward Ricardo Quaresma (L) celebrates with Nani after scoring during the round of s …
And just seven minutes into the second period, Croatia came bursting out of the blocks, thankfully.
Portugal claimed it with three minutes of extra-time remaining, breaking upfield after Croatia came close.
Ronaldo, who became the first player to score at four separate European Championships, has also been embroiled in controversy, being caught on camera throwing a reporter’s microphone into a lake.
Croatia and Portugal didn’t have a shot on target for 117 minutes of football, but Ricardo Quaresma’s tap-in proved decisive.
Croatia were doing most of the second-half pressing, and nearly took the lead when Domagoj Vida met a Darijo Srna free-kick with a firm header but put the ball narrowly wide.
Coach Ante Cacic’s men had gone from dark horses to one of the favourites for the title after three impressive displays in Group D, including a 2-1 win over Spain.
Both sides knew that they would face Poland in the quarter-final stage should they have progressed but neither side had any real attacking quality in the game with the match ending 0-0 after full-time. Quaresma stooped to head the ball into an unguarded goal from close range.
“Sometimes I think we should have passed the ball faster, that didn’t work out as we wanted, but we should congratulate Croatia, they didn’t let us play as we wanted”. It seemed inevitable that the record would be extended to extra time as well.
The match had been labeled as one of the ties of the round, but it didn’t really take off until both sides were staring at the prospect of a penalty shootout.
Mandžukić had a half-chance with his header, some space opened for Strinić in the closing minutes of the first half, but there was no trouble for the Portuguese keeper. Neither managed to find a late breakthrough, however, so the match headed for extra time.
Renato Sanches, on as a replacement for Andre Gomes, supplied more drive in the midfield and skewed wide from the edge of the box after working an opening through a one-two with Joao Mario.
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In fact; the remainder of the game produced no further goalscoring opportunities, meaning after 90 minutes in Lens – neither Croatia or Portugal registered a single shot on target.
