Cristiano Ronaldo likely played his final World Cup match as Portugal fell 1-0 to Spain. At 41 years old, the forward started and played all 90 minutes for Portugal but was unable to get on the scoresheet one last time.<\/p>\n
Ronaldo’s first involvement occurred in the 11th minute. Portugal earned a corner kick taken by Bruno Fernandes, and Ronaldo appealed for a penalty in the penalty area, but play continued.\u00a0<\/p>\n
One minute later, Fernandes intercepted a pass from Pedri and passed to Ronaldo. Ronaldo shot from inside the penalty area, forcing Sim\u00f3n to deflect the ball wide for another corner.<\/p>\n
Portugal created another opportunity for Ronaldo in the 37th minute. Pedro Neto sent a cross into the area from the right wing, and Jo\u00e3o F\u00e9lix headed the ball toward the center.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Ronaldo made contact with the ball with his back turned to the net, sending a shot toward goal that was caught by Spain’s goalkeeper Unai Sim\u00f3n.<\/p>\n
In first-half stoppage time, Jo\u00e3o Neves attempted to loft a pass over the defense to Ronaldo, but Sim\u00f3n moved to collect the ball.<\/p>\n
Portugal continued to look for Ronaldo after halftime. In the 48th minute, Dani Olmo fouled Ronaldo to give Portugal a free-kick in Spain’s half, but the cross from Fernandes went directly to Sim\u00f3n.\u00a0<\/p>\n
In the 52nd minute, Neto ran down the wing and sent a low cross into the six-yard box, but neither Ronaldo nor Felix reached the pass.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Ronaldo had another chance in the 60th minute when Felix chipped a cross to the back post, but Ronaldo could not direct his shot on target.<\/p>\n
Spain held on for the victory to secure a spot in the quarterfinals.<\/p>\n
After the final whistle, cameras focused on Ronaldo as he concluded what is expected to be his final appearance in an international tournament. Before leaving the pitch, Ronaldo shared a moment with Spain’s Lamine Yamal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
POPULAR SEARCHES BROWSE BY Cristiano Ronaldo likely played his final World Cup match as Portugal fell 1-0 to Spain. At 41 years old, the forward started and played all 90 minutes for Portugal but was unable to get on the scoresheet one last time. Ronaldo’s first involvement occurred in the 11th minute. Portugal earned a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":6298,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6299","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-soccer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6299","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6299"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6299\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6298"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6299"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6299"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6299"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}