Serbia 2-2 Portugal
Portugal and Serbia played out an entertaining draw in tonight’s World Cup 2022 qualification match in Belgrade, a game which the visitors had in the bag before Serbia stunned them with a second half onslaught.
The two teams share the lead in Group A and, at odds of 3.65 here at SBOTOP, a draw was a fair result, as Portugal were the more incisive in the first half, before Serbia fought back with a vengeance in the second period.
The European champions were two up at the break thanks to a Diogo Jota double, before Aleksandar Mitrovic pulled a goal back for Serbia early in the second half and Fllip Kostic leveled on the hour.
Highlights of the game
Portugal struggled to get past Azerbaijan in midweek, winning 1-0 courtesy of an own goal, but they bagged two in the first half tonight, both in open play and both headers converted by Jota. Wide man Bernardo Silva is a key player in Manchester City’s quadruple chasing team and he showed he’ll be a man to watch in the World Cup 2022 highlights when he fired in a pinpoint cross for the Liverpool striker to meet at the far post and he planted his header past Marko Dmitrovic and into the net.
11 minutes on the clock and the Selecao were in charge.
Captain Dusan Tadic made all three assists in Serbia’s 3-2 victory over the Republic of Ireland last week, and he tried to get his team back in the game with a series of dangerous balls into the Portugal area but his strikers were wasteful, though Mitrovic came close with one header. And after a series of opportunities for the hosts Jota showed them how to do it again, this time meeting a cross from Cedric Soares and stooping to nod home his second.
Two goals to the good it looked like plain sailing for the Selecao at the break but Serbia came out fighting and leveled within 15 minutes of the second half.
Only one minute had passed when the deficit was halved, Mitrovic beating two Portugal defenders to a cross from Nemanja Radonjic and heading home. The Fulham striker scored a brace in last week’s 3-2 victory over the Republic of Ireland and now, with 39 goals, he had become Serbia’s top scorer of all time.
Tadic tested Antony Lopes in the Serbia goal with a fierce strike from distance and then, from the resulting corner he sent in a fantastic cross glanced on by Sergej Milinkovic-Savic but the ball flew agonizingly wide.
Then, on the hour, it was all square and Radonjic, on as a half time substitute, was again the provider. As Portugal probed, Serbia overturned possession and when Tadic fed Radjonic he slid the ball through to Filip Kostic who kept his cool to slide the ball under Lopes and into the net.
2-2 and Serbia fully deserved to be level.
There was high drama in the closing minutes when Nikola Milenkovic saw red for a nasty challenge on Danilo, and then Cristiano Ronaldo thought he’d won it at the death when he slid the ball in from an angle and it was cleared off the line.
I thought it was over the line and I was not alone, as Ronaldo was booked for his protests.
Key statistics
Despite Portugal’s two goal advantage the first half stats told a story of an even match in terms of possession and shots.
By the end of the game, while the Selecao had 55 per cent possession, Serbia won the shot count by 16 to 12 and each team had five on target.
The stats reflected the final score-line.
Portugal are one of ten teams in with a realistic chance of glory in Qatar according to the early World Cup 2022 betting odds but after two games of the qualifiers they clearly have work to do.
What’s next?
Europe’s top leagues are back in action next week when, in the Premier League, leaders Manchester City are away to Champions League hopefuls Leicester City. City’s Portugal contingent of Silva, Ruben Dias and Joao Cancelo are sure to be in action for that mouth-watering prospect.
There’s also an eye-catching fixture in La Liga where fourth placed Sevilla host league leaders Atletico Madrid. Los Rojiblancos’ lead at the top has been cut to four points by a resurgent Barcelona. Joao Felix, who climbed off the bench for the last five minutes for Portugal tonight, will hope to be in the thick of the action for that one.
But before all that there’s more entertainment to come in the World Cup qualifiers. In tonight’s other Group A fixture the Republic of Ireland put in a pitiful showing to lose 0-1 at home to minnows Luxembourg.
And in the next round of matches Portugal have an away game to Luxembourg while Serbia head to Azerbaijan to take on Gianni de Biasi’s underdogs. Both will fully expect to end this sequence of games with three more points.
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