Although the Portuguese team this year is not considered the number 1 candidate for the EURO championship, they still had a successful qualifying campaign. Recently, the 2016 champion had a successful rehearsal when winning 3-0 against Ireland in the final friendly match, the two main strikers Joao Felix and Cristiano Ronaldo both scored.
Cristiano Ronaldo “heated up” for EURO with a double against Ireland
Ronaldo alone scored a double and his performance certainly made coach Roberto Martinez happy. The 39-year-old striker had many chances to finish and beat Ireland goalkeeper Caoimhin Kelleher in the 50th minute with a goal reminiscent of his younger self: A stepover in front of the opponent’s defender, pushing the ball to his left foot. before curling the ball very hard into the high corner of the far post.
That “cannon” was still not enough for Ronaldo. 10 minutes later, he ran in the right rhythm to catch a pass from Diogo Jota. He was closely marked, but Ronaldo kicked the striker right into the near corner with strong kicking power to score a double. He almost had a hat-trick but missed the post after a step back, cleverly breaking Ireland’s offside trap, not to mention CR7’s redirected free kick hitting the post in the first half.
These two goals marked 130 goals at the national team level for Ronaldo and in total he has 895 goals at all levels in his football career. Portuguese public opinion is even eagerly waiting to see if Ronaldo can reach the 900 goal mark at this EURO.
More importantly, Ronaldo had a practical argument to respond to calls to put him on the bench. Due to playing in Saudi Arabia and his advanced age, Ronaldo was said by many Portuguese media that he should play less frequently than before, not because he was not good at scoring goals but because his physical condition was no longer at a level where he could play. Many matches can last up to 120 minutes.
But speaking of age, Ronaldo’s number of goals for Portugal since reaching the age of 30 is 78 goals and has surpassed the number of 77 goals “King of Soccer” Pele scored for Brazil. This number is of course not to underestimate Pele (he played a total of 92 matches for Brazil, while Ronaldo played 88 matches for Portugal since he turned 30), but to say that Ronaldo’s international career so good that it could be divided into the careers of two separate players and still be equally great.
After the match Ronaldo said he will enjoy every moment on the field for the national team because there will come a time when he can no longer do that. “I don’t have much time to spend with football anymore, so I will cherish occasions like this. I love football, every match is special. Attending EURO with the Portuguese national team , for me it is still like a dream, still like when I was 20 years old,” he said.
