The victory was lucky, but who cares about that afterwards? Cristiano Ronaldo showed against Scotland why he is still important at the age of 39.
Cristiano Ronaldo can also play as a substitute: With the 901st goal of his career, the 39-year-old gave hosts Portugal a lucky win against Scotland in the Nations League. In Lisbon, the European Championship quarter-finalists won 2-1 (0-1) after falling behind early on, with Ronaldo, who came on as a substitute in the second half, scoring the winning goal in the 88th minute.
Scott McTominay of SSC Napoli had given Scotland, who had lost 5-1 to Germany at the European Championship, the lead with a header in the 7th minute. It remained the visitors’ only good chance in the first half.
With Ronaldo, who had scored the 900th goal of his career in Thursday’s 2-1 win against Croatia, Portugal pushed for an equalizer after the break – and were rewarded with an equalizer from Bruno Fernandes (54′). Shortly before the end, Ronaldo pushed the ball over the line from close range to win the match.
European champions Spain celebrated a clear victory in the Nations League. The defending champions beat Switzerland 4-1, although the Iberians played with a man down for around 70 minutes. Central defender Robin Le Normand was shown the red card after an emergency tackle (21′).
At the time of the sending off, the team of successful coach Luis de la Fuente, who had only played a 0-0 draw in Serbia in the opening match, were already 2-0 up thanks to goals from Joselu (4th) and Fabian (14th). But then Le Normand stopped ex-Gladbach player Breel Embolo with an emergency stop and the game initially turned. But three days after the 0-2 defeat in Denmark, Switzerland could not manage more than a goal by Zeki Amdouni (42nd) – instead, Fabian (77th) and Ferran Torres (80th) even increased the lead for the guests.
While Dortmund’s Gregor Kobel was in the Swiss goal and Augsburg’s Rubén Vargas played his 50th international match, Silvan Widmer from Mainz 05 had to sit out at short notice after an injury during warm-up. For Spain, Alejandro Grimaldo was in the starting eleven, in contrast to his Leverkusen club colleague Aleix Garcia.
