Youssef En-Nesyri’s header three minutes before half-time wins quarter-final clash leaving Ronaldo in tears
When the total 44,198 crowd were allowed into Al Thumama, everyone bore witness to this red letter day. Jannah. The Arabic for paradise can also means small bird, when spelt Jena, and tonight Doha is a place where thousands of lightheaded souls can flutter about. And breath.
The clue is in the title. Delivery and legacy, one follows the other, and after the latest scenes outside Al Thumama, maybe they can deliver a method of allowing ticket holders into these infamous stadiums before kick-off.Speaking of legacy, Cristiano Ronaldo’s is now written. The 37 year-old entered the fray just as Romain Saïss, the Morocco captain tasked to shadow him, was stretchered off with a shredded hamstring.
The Moroccans did not stay away, they could not get in. Packing the nearby Souq Waqif by lunchtime, arriving from all over the region, along with plane loads from Rabat, Casablanca and Marrakesh, plenty complained of prohibitive black-market ticket prices. By the 25th minute, with the match still scoreless, swathes of empty seats began to be filled by red caped Moroccans and Qataris, in distinctive white thobes. By then, Portugal should have led but Bono palmed Félix’s downward header away for a corner after Bruno Fernandes’ dangerous free kick.
After the En-Nesyri goal, Portugal instinctively swung at the jugular. Of the referee. First Otavio dived beside Hakimi, seeking to enrage the Paris Saint Germain fullback into retaliation with a pinch of his leg. Argentinian official Facundo Tello also saw past a Fernandes hustle, when he also collapsed in the box near Hakimi; the engine in this remarkably disciplined Moroccan machine.
The second half was helter-skelter but the Atlas Lions dropped into Walid Regragui’s well honed defensive shape which is magnificently gelled by Sofyan Amrabat.
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