{"id":1222,"date":"2026-07-13T15:54:55","date_gmt":"2026-07-13T14:54:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mediaconversation.com\/?p=1222"},"modified":"2026-07-13T15:54:56","modified_gmt":"2026-07-13T14:54:56","slug":"portugals-world-cup-dream-crushed-by-spain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mediaconversation.com\/?p=1222","title":{"rendered":"Portugal’s World Cup Dream Crushed By Spain"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Okusor Destiny Chukwunazamekpele<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Spain defeated Portugal 1-0 after a late goal deep in stoppage time by substitute Mikel merino.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cristiano Ronaldo last dance at the world cup ended after an underperforming Portuguese team disappointed lots of fans considering the calibre of players they have.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Portugal midfield trio of Bruno Fernandes, vithina and Jo\u00e3o neves (Three of the best in the world) struggled to help the team and they could not progress from the round of 16. Ronaldo’s world cup ends in disappointment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Roberto Martinez Steps Down As Portuguese Head Coach<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Portuguese football federation confirms the end of Roberto Martinez’s contract as the head coach. It came two days after Portugal lost to Spain in the world cup that saw them exit the world cup. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Martinez said he came to Portugal to win cup and he did that after winning the nations league against Spanish national team in year 2025<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Portugal also appointed new head coach Jorge Jesus who was the former manager of Cristiano Ronaldo at Al-Nassr. He recently won Al-Nassr the league in the recently concluded Saudi pro league season. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cristiano Ronaldo confirmed it will be his last world cup and he won’t make any rash decisions out of emotion after the exit to Spain. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Martinez called him an “exemplary captain”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lots of Cristiano Ronaldo fans had a lot say about Portugal’s exit<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Portuguese national team didn’t play as a team as they were not good enough. OKPAKO WISDOM (BIO CHEMISTRY 400 LEVEL) said “the Portuguese national team were not playing for Cristiano and there wasn’t enough fight for the team , he said and  likened it to Argentina as they fight for Lionel Messi, but the Portuguese national team left a forty one year old Ronaldo to do it all by himself”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He said they needed to do better that Ronaldo had done everything he needed to do for the Portuguese national team. Now it was left for them to fight for him as their captain and as the greatest Portugal player of all time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Alexander Maro, a 400-level Chemistry student, also shared his thoughts on the painful exit. He stated that the midfield pairing of Vitinha and Jo\u00e3o Neves suffered tactical disconnect leaving the midfield unbalanced. He said it ruined the team’s flow and prevented Bruno Fernandes from performing well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Portugal exit the world cup, while Ronaldo bows as the nation’s greatest player ever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Okusor Destiny Chukwunazamekpele Spain defeated Portugal 1-0 after a late goal deep in stoppage time by substitute Mikel merino. Cristiano Ronaldo last dance at the world cup ended after an underperforming Portuguese team disappointed lots of fans considering the calibre of players they have. Portugal midfield trio of Bruno Fernandes, vithina and Jo\u00e3o neves […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1224,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"iawp_total_views":40,"footnotes":""},"categories":[119,14],"tags":[311,125,222,310,126],"class_list":["post-1222","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment","category-trendingnews","tag-311","tag-fifa","tag-portugal","tag-spain","tag-world-cup"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mediaconversation.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1222","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mediaconversation.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mediaconversation.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mediaconversation.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mediaconversation.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1222"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mediaconversation.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1222\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1225,"href":"https:\/\/mediaconversation.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1222\/revisions\/1225"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mediaconversation.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1224"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mediaconversation.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1222"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mediaconversation.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1222"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mediaconversation.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1222"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}