France defeat Portugal 5-3 on penalties to qualify for Euro 2024 semi-finals

Joao Felix missed a penalty for Portugal as Les Blues reach semi-final

France defeated Portugal in a penalty shootout in their quarterfinal match in Hamburg, and now they will play Spain in the semifinals of the 2024 European Championship.

Both teams wasted numerous opportunities in the last portion of the encounter, which lacked any attacking quality. In the goalkeeping duo of Mike Maignan and Diogo Costa proved their mettle. Maignan stops Bruno Fernandes and Vitinha at close range, and Costa helps neutralise Kylian Mbappe’s threat.

After 120 minutes, the teams were unable to distinguish themselves, and a penalty shootout was used to decide the winner. For Portugal, Ronaldo stepped up first to take the spot kick but a miss for Joao Felix saw the Selecao eliminated from the competition as Theo Hernandez scored the last penalty for France to send them to the semi-final.

For Roberto Martinez’s team to defeat Slovenia, penalties were necessary. In the end, Diogo Costa carried the Portuguese to victory by becoming the first custodian to save three penalties in a European Championship shootout. Cristiano Ronaldo had a chance saved by Jan Oblak in extra time.

France, led by Didier Deschamps, overcame Belgium in spite of a fairly mediocre effort. Belgium scored an own goal which was game only goal that helped France advance to the quarterfinals, which means that none of the French players have scored in the current tournament’s four games.

France are yet to score a goal in the competition after their only goal came from a penalty that Mbappe scored against Poland, while the rest of them have come from their own goals and their win over Portugal came via shootouts.

Now against Spain it won’t be easy who overcame host nation Germany to reach the semi-final and it’s going to be one of the most exciting matchups between the two best nations in Europe.

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