Euro 2024: In Heartbreak For Czech, Cristiano Ronaldo's Portugal Wins Thriller (Image: Facebook.com/cristianoronaldo)
It had to be 21-year old Francisco Conceicao to win the game for Portugal at Leipzig, Germany, in their opener group match in the Euro 2024 against Czech Republic. In a match, when Cristiano Ronaldo, who was the centre of attention for 20 years in the world football showed glimpses of his greatness, remained only a major name in the ground, as a self goal and a late goal from Francisco Conceicao helped his side to mark the victory in a completely absorbing match in Group F on Tuesday.
Multimillion superstars of Portugal side including Al Nassr’s Cristiano Ronaldo; Porto’s Diogo Costa and Pepe; Manchester City’s Ruben Dias and Bernardo Silva; Paris Saint-Germain’s Nuno Mendes, Danilo Pereira and Vitinha; Barcelona’s Joao Cancelo, Manchester United’s Bruno Fernandes, and AC Milan’s Rafael Leao could not make it inside the net as the Czech managed to settle for flawless defense most of the time.
Czech had found a lead with Slavia Prague’s Lukas Provod in second half as the first half remained goalless, but, the happy moments of the Ivan Hasek’s Czech Republic team have not lasted more than seven minutes. For the Czech, it was not just a match for survival, but for the glory mountain to climb against Cristiano Ronaldo’s Portugal side. They have proved it that they could be giant killers, but Robin Hranac’s self goal from a rebound of Nuno Mendes’s header and Francisco Conceicao’s last minute goal demolished their ambitions.
The self goal, highly unfortunate way to concede a goal in a most watchable match, however, did not take away their fighting spirit. They defended till the last minute and they did so really well against the stars-packed Portugal attack.
But agony struck them when Francisco Conceicao, who is almost half the age of Cristiano Ronaldo, came off the bench and gave the Portuguese much needed boost in their opening match – a last minute goal happened due to the absence of enough defence in Czech goal area.
