It might be just the small outsider Liechtenstein, but Cristiano Ronaldo was merciless: the Portuguese came back to the national team under the new manager and broke another two records while scoring a brace: Portugal – Liechtenstein 4-0. In a first game of the EURO 2024 qualifying matches, Portugal had an easy task against European minors and contrary to some reports, Roberto Martinez decided to call Ronaldo and leave him as the captain. Former Real and Manchester player started the match, thus becoming the most-capped men’s player in history with 197 appearances for Portugal. His two goals were the ‘cherry on top’ of a celebration cake and the second one, a thunderbolt from a free kick made him the first male player to score 100 competitive international goals.Another record for Cristiano Ronaldo 😤 pic.twitter.com/0luRoGcFQV— B/R Football (@brfootball) March 23, 2023 It took Portugal only eight minutes to score the first goal. After the corner, keeper Buchel punches the ball forward, and the Bayern defender took his chances from 20 meters. The ball went to a ‘forest’ of legs, the keeper didn’t have a good look and there it was, 1-0. But even when the home crowd expected that other goals will start to pour in, that didn’t happen until the second half. It took Portuguese 40 minutes to score again, but when Bernardo Silva finally scored and the game was secured, Cristiano Ronaldo became the main actor of the match. He first converted a penalty in the 51st minute before scoring a great free-kick in the 63rd. The new coach Roberto Martinez didn’t wait for Ronaldo to score a hat-trick and took him out in the 78th minute and the Portuguese forwards didn’t seem to be upset by the substitution. Apart from the expected Portugal win, Slovakia made an unpleasant surprise to its fans buy finishing the match with Luxembourg without goals, while Denmark won 3-1 in the Northern Europe derby with Finland, courtesy of Atalanta’s Rasmus Winther Højlund’s hat trick.Cristiano Ronaldo with his 120th International goal 🇵🇹100th competative goal🔥197th game for him making him the most capped International player in football HISTORY!!!#CristianoRonaldo #GOAT pic.twitter.com/wqN3hahE04— Sumit Maiti (@sumit_22_11) March 23, 2023 EURO 2024 – QualifiersThursday Kazakhstan – Slovenia 1-2 (1-0)/Samodorov 24 – Brekalo 47, Vipotnik 78/Slovakia – Luxembourg 0-0N.Macedonia – Malta 2-1 (0-0)/Elmas 66, Churlinov 72 – Yannick 86/B&H – Iceland 3-0 (2-0)/Krunic 14, 40, Dedic 63/Italy – England 1-2 (0-2)/Retegui 56 – Rice 13, Kane 44 pen/Denmark – Finland 3-1 (1-0)/Hojlund 21, 82, 90+3 – Antman 54/San Marino – N.Ireland 0-2 (0-1)/Charles 24, 55/Portugal – Liechtenstein 4-0 (1-0)/Cancelo 8, Silva 47, Ronaldo 51 pen, 63/Friday 20.00: (2.70) Bulgaria (2.95) Montenegro (2.90)22.45: (1.10) Serbia (10.0) Lithuania (23.0)22.45: (3.35) Sweden (3.25) Belgium (2.25)22.45: (2.50) Czech R. (3.15) Poland (3.00)22.45: (1.90) France (3.45) Netherlands (4.20)22.45: (30.0) Gibraltar (12.0) Greece (1.07)22.45: (2.50) Moldova (3.00) Faroe I. (3.15)22.45: (1.25) Austria (5.80) Azerbaijan (12.0)Saturday 17.00: (1.28) Scotland (5.50) Cyprus (11.0)20.00: (8.00) Armenia (4.50) Turkey (1.42)20.00: (12.0) Belarus (5.80) Switzerland (1.25)20.00: (1.95) Israel (3.40) Kosovo* (4.10)22.45: (1.37) Spain (4.70) Norway (9.00)22.45: (1.60) Croatia (3.70) Wales (6.25)22.45: (15.0) Andorra (6.50) Romania (1.20)*** odds are subject to change ***
