At the stroke of midnight, in the early hours of Wednesday morning, Portugal's shining star of soccer, Cron, temporarily retired for two acts on the international friendly stage, only to re-bloom in the subsequent fixture, scoring two consecutive goals to take his national team's goal tally towards the impressive 130 mark. At dawn next Wednesday (19th), the Portuguese national team swept aside Ireland with a 3-0 record to set up an upcoming UEFA Europa League first-round clash against the Czech Republic.
In the last warm-up match of the preparation for the Euro Cup, Crown chose to take a rest, while Portugal's leader Martinez handpicked a strong squad, which naturally included Crown's figure. At the beginning of the match, Portugal showed strong offensive firepower, with Noufenandis' precise long pass creating a good opportunity for Ofelix to shoot.
The stage was handed over to Cron for the changeover. In the 50th minute, he fired a left-footed shot from the right side of the box into the far corner of the empty net in a classic move. Just ten minutes later, the nearly 40-year-old legend was at it again, scoring twice. It is worth mentioning that Cron's penalty kick early in the game was blocked by the opposing team's wall, and then the ball hit the goal post and bounced out, narrowly missing a "hat-trick".
Cron has become one of the highest goal scorers in men's international soccer. After scoring two more goals in this campaign, his goal tally reached 130. After the game, Cron said excitedly on social media, "It was a great victory and we are about to enter the Europa League!" Portugal are in Group F of the Europa League and face strong opponents such as the Czech Republic, Georgia and Turkey, so the road to promotion is not optimistic.
