Split (Croatia) (AFP)
The Portugal of Cristiano Ronaldo won with difficulty (3-2) against a Croatia long reduced to ten, Tuesday in Split, but which avoided relegation to the second division of the League of Nations to the detriment of Sweden, beaten in France (4-2).
The vice-world champions, thus finish in 3rd place in this group 3 of League A with 3 points, as much as Sweden but with a better goal difference, behind France (16 pts) and Portugal (13 pts) , defending champion removed from the "Final-4" after his defeat against the Blues (1-0) on Saturday in Lisbon.
Deprived of Ronaldo in the first leg, the European champions had made a real demonstration by beating Croatia (4-1).
This time, despite the result, their performance was sluggish.
In the absence of Pepe, Portuguese defense boss, the Croats opened the scoring through Chelsea midfielder Mateo Kovacic thanks to a poor clearance from Ruben Semedo (1-0, 29th).
It was not until the return of the locker room and the exclusion of Marko Rog, who received a second yellow card for a foul on Ronaldo (51st), for Portugal to materialize its domination, until then sterile.
After a free kick from the same Ronaldo, Ruben Dias, central defender of Manchester City, scored the first goal of his international career (1-1, 52nd).
Joao Felix then took advantage of the fact that the referee did not whistle a hand from Diogo Jota to give the advantage to the visitors (1-2, 60th), but Kovacic immediately after played a Portuguese defense too passive to equalize by hitting the flat of the right foot at the entrance to the surface (2-2, 65th).
It was only at the very end of the game that Ruben Dias relieved his family by inheriting a ball dropped in his 5.50m by the Croatian goalkeeper Dominik Livakovic (2-3, 90th).
© 2020 AFP