PORTUGAL 1-1 DR CONGO: Cristiano Ronaldo failed to respond to Lionel Messi’s stunning hat-trick as his country were held to a shock draw by their minnow opponents
This was after the Lord Mayor’s Show – and Cristiano Ronaldo found himself the faded star of it.
For all the right reasons. Because if Lionel Messi had served up the main course 24 hours earlier, all his greatest rival could dish out here was a load of scraps.
While in the process finding himself upstaged by a striker who cost less than Ronaldo earns in six months in Saudi Arabia. Someone who managed just one goal last season. Take a bow Yoane Wissa.
That’s not a sentence Newcastle United supporters expected to read, considering how miserable Wissa’s first campaign on Tyneside turned out to be.
But Wissa put all that behind him with a historic first half equaliser, to notch DR Congo’s first ever World Cup goal and secure a stunning upset in Houston.
This had supposed to have been Ronaldo’s response to seeing the cream rise to the top in North America. The first man to score in six different World Cups. He had watched Messi plunder three stunning goals in his own World Cup opening game in Kansas.
While Kylian Mbappe and Erling Haaland had also helped themselves to braces in their respective games. It meant Ronaldo was under pressure to remind people he could still be one of the top dogs.
If Ronaldo wanted to dispel theories he is a spent force, he couldn’t have wished for a more inviting stage. Roberto Martinez’s men appeared to have taken complete control, pinning Congo deep inside their own half.
Joao Neves struck the first blow inside six minutes, rising to meet Pedro Neto’s cross and guide a superb header past Lionel Mpasi.
Wissa tried to respond, but curled a shot just wide, while Cedric Bakumbu weaved past two defenders but saw his effort deflected for a corner.
Portugal dominated the ball, but perhaps the ‘Leopards’ were not going to be pussycats after all? Each time Ronaldo took possession, there was a rise in the octane levels.
But he was becoming frustrated, something reflected in the fact his most significant contribution of the first half was to remonstrate with the referee for booking Bernardo Silva.
Whisper it, but this team no longer revolves around its talisman. Bruno Fernandes, Neves, Silva and Vitinha were pulling most of the strings. Silva just failed to convert a cross from Fernandes, while his own cross almost picked out Ronaldo.
Joao Cancelo’s centre was also agonisingly out of reach of Ronaldo moments later. Yet Congo were refusing to become Portugal’s puppets.
And the unthinkable happened when Congo equalised through Wissa on the stroke of half time, to leave the favourites stunned.
Congo could smell blood, and Bakumbu struck the post, while Mpasi’s long throw launched a rapid counter attack from the Africans, but Bakumbu lashed his shot over the crossbar.
Then came Ronaldo’s two big moments to make a difference and spare some Portugal’s faced being left as red as their shirts. Both created by substitute Francisco Conceicao – and both wasted.
Portugal were becoming desperate, but not desperate enough for Martinez to haul Ronaldo off. Such an act of footballing treason was beyond him. Martinez is rumoured to be standing down after this World Cup.
But at this rate, he might be gone much sooner than he’d planned – and it won’t have been his decision.
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