Portugal came back from behind to beat Croatia 2-1 and book their spot in the round of 16 of the World Cup.
It was a crazy one in Toronto – probably the most dramatic ending of the tournament so far. An electric second half saw three goals scored and three others disallowed as the Selecao das Quinas prevailed over the Vatreni.
Portugal dominated the first half but it was Croatia who opened the scoring early on in the second, courtesy of Ivan Perisic. Cristiano Ronaldo then finally scored the first World Cup knockout stage goal of his career to make it 1-1 and Goncalo Ramos turned the game on its head in stoppage time.
How did Portugal beat Croatia in ‘illogical’ match?
Wingers taking on responsibility
Roberto Martinez’s plan all along was to try and hurt the opposition with his wingers. There was a clear and heavy emphasis on getting Rafael Leao and Pedro Neto one-on-one opportunities to take defenders on and whip crosses and pass-backs into the box.
And the Spaniard will be pleased to have handed Leao the (deserved) start over Joao Felix. But more on that later.
Portugal used the 3-2-5 as a base-scheme that often became a 3-1-6, a 3-1-5-1 and a few other variants. Once again, they tried different in-possession shapes – but this time had a lot more movement, rotations and flow to their actions compared to their group stage games. And Leao was a big reason for that, being more active than Felix was in the previous matches.
Nuno Mendes was the most common player to form the back-three alongside Ruben Dias and Renato Veiga. Though he did charge forward from time to time and let Vitinha occupy that space instead. Joao Cancelo spent more time in the five-man attacking line, tucking inside while Pedro Neto held width down the right.
Bruno Fernandes was mostly a second striker alongside Cristiano Ronaldo. They were both in central positions looking to get on the end of crosses and pass-backs.
The Manchester United midfielder actually had Portugal’s first two big chances – both in the same play, which he failed to put away. And it came thanks to Leao using a body feint to lose Josip Stanisic and attack down the left, cutting it back to Bruno.
Pedro Neto had few opportunities to make something happen, as the right side saw fewer action than the left. But they looked for him with switches of play and long balls especially early on in the first half. Though those attempts disappeared completely in the second.
Leao had quite an erratic game, but still created things out of nowhere. Other than the chances Bruno missed four minutes in, he hit the crossbar with a beautiful curling effort from distance in the 58th minute and, of course, the assist for Goncalo Ramos’ winner in stoppage time.
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Portugal’s defensive woes
Portugal did show a few weaknesses against Croatia, it just took the Blazers time (and a change in approach) to take advantage of them.
It has been their pattern to start slow and only in the second half make changes, whether they are structural or just ‘psychological’.
Roberto Martinez deployed a highly aggressive man-to-man press and asked his double-pivot of PSG teammates Vitinha and Joao Neves to step up almost every time. It trapped Croatia in the first half and allowed them to control possession – even forcing Zlatko Dalic to put Nikola Vlasic as a right-wing-back, as he did against Ghana.
But in the second half, Dalic went for it a lot more. They attempted and managed to connect more mid-to-long range passes forward and suddenly found themselves constantly in four-on-four situations against Portugal’s backline.
Needless to say it blew the game wide open, making it much more interesting for neutrals, but also leaving Croatia closer to scoring. They had very few transitions in the first half but got a shot off in each one of them. Then, saw an opening and decided to have a go in the second half.
Vitinha and Neves jumping forward to press was precisely what allowed the Blazers to score the opener. There was a bit of confusion with Portugal thinking it was their throw-in, but Neves was already wide to defend near the ball and Vitinha decided to go forward, leaving their back-four completely exposed.
Croatia then managed to occupy spaces in between them inside the box, which made it impossible for Portugal to defend crosses. Additionally, Rafael Leao’s poor defensive support meant Nuno Mendes had to defend Vlasic who had the ball initially and also Josip Stanisic who overlapped to make the cross that ended with Perisic’s goal.
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Soon after going up 1-0, Croatia then scored another – though it was correctly ruled out. But once again, they beat Portugal’s pressure down the middle and got rewarded with yet another four-on-four against the Portuguese defence completely unprotected.
Lack of support from the wingers also manifested a few other times and gave time and space for Croatian midfielders to choose whether they would connect overlapping full-backs or cross into the box with favourable situations for Igor Matanovic to head the ball.
Martinez then corrected by subbing off Cristiano Ronaldo and going from the 4-4-2 to the 4-3-3. Ruben Neves’ presence meant that Bernardo Silva and Joao Neves could jump forward to press without completely exposing the defence.
Far-post crosses gallore
With favourable situations inside the box due to Portugal’s exposed defence, Croatia abused far-post crosses. For the opener, Stanisic’s presence dragged Nuno Mendes out wide, meaning there were three Portuguese defenders inside the box against three Croatian forwards.
Petar Sucic positioned himself between Veiga and Dias, Matanovic between Dias and Cancelo, and Perisic completely alone behind Cancelo. No numerical superiority, but a clear positional advantage.
A few minutes later, Mario Pasalic and Perisic doubled against Nelson Semedo and the Atalanta midfielder used his teammate as ‘bait’ to open up the body angle for the cross. He targeted Matanovic in the far post and the striker nearly scored, with Diogo Costa saving the day.
This is the main way in which the Blazers’ improvement in the second half manifested.
Ironically, however, Portugal then gave Croatia a taste of their own medicine. It was precisely a far-post cross that won them the game, from Rafael Leao to Goncalo Ramos.
However, we must reiterate how poor of a job Marin Pongracic and Josko Gvardiol both did. Not only did they not jump with Ramos, but also held him down and the striker still managed to guide the ball to the back of the net.
And there would have been one more goal-ending far-post cross if it wasn’t for Fifa’s cricket-inspired ‘snickometer’ that meant Pasalic was offside for Gvardiol’s equaliser, ultimately ruling it out.
Overall, it was quite an ‘illogical’ game. Portugal dominated the first half but went to the break with nothing to show for it. Meanwhile Croatia were far superior in the second half and even striked first, but ended up losing in heartbreaking fashion.
That is why we love football and the World Cup. Now it’s an Iberian duel in the round of 16 with Portugal and Spain coming up.