Football: The Strongest Hexagon Warrior

Martin's two goals helped Portugal take the lead. The Croatians felt a huge gap from leading to falling behind, but they knew that if they could not equalize the score in a short time, the result would be a loss.

This is very cruel to the old comrades in the team.

This World Cup will most likely be the last World Cup of his career.

Increasing the number of attackers is one of the few ways to attack.

The game time is approaching eighty minutes, and there is no way out.

As for whether the game will be killed by Portugal's counterattack, there is no room for consideration.

Portugal, which was leading the score, quickly shrank its defense, leaving only Ronaldo in front to act as a counterattack point.

In the 78th minute, Portugal made personnel adjustments.

Quaresma replaced seat B, who was lacking in physical fitness.

The intention of this adjustment is obvious.

Use Quaresma's abundant physical fitness to enrich the coverage area of ​​the overall defensive system, and at the same time serve as Ronaldo's wingman when switching from defense to offense, preparing to kill the game.

Croatia's ball possession ratio has improved rapidly and has gone from lagging to leading.

The four "wonderful" men of Modric, Rakitic, Brozovic and Kovacic have conflicting functions to some extent, and will appear to be a bit slow in terms of offensive organization.

It seems that the proportion of ball possession is getting higher and higher, but most of them are passed back and forth outside the 30-meter offensive zone without any threat.

Dangerous area passes that actually get into the final third are few and far between.

"aoaooaooooooo——"

The Portuguese fans at Fisht Stadium were impassioned and shouted one wave after another.

The Croatian fans were worried and looked nervously at the players who were patiently organizing the offense.

They are looking forward to scoring an equalizer, but are also worried about Portugal's transition from defense to offense.

The player wearing the red No. 10 is likely to create enough scoring opportunities again at some point.

Once he helps Portugal expand the score, the game will completely lose suspense.

Croatia took full control of the game and put enough pressure on the Portuguese defense. While attacking with all their strength, they also consciously paid attention to protection when switching from offense to defense, and did not give Martin, Moutinho and others a chance to touch the ball.

The advantage of having more people in the middle is highlighted at this time.

Even if there is a mistake in the offensive pass, pressure can be quickly formed based on the proximity principle to increase the opponent's passing success rate.

Even Cristiano Ronaldo, Moutinho and Quaresma will not be able to handle accurately under strong pressure.

Martin is the exception, and his catches look like they've been calculated with computer precision every time.

The only way to delay Portugal's transition from defense to offense is to commit a foul.

For this reason, Brozovic and Kovacic, who came on the bench, received yellow cards respectively.

The time came to the 87th minute, and there were still three minutes left before regular time. Including injury time, it was only seven or eight minutes at most.

Ten minutes have passed since the score fell behind. The Croatian players are getting more and more anxious, but the decline in physical fitness cannot be ignored.

At the beginning, I could grit my teeth and persevere with the spirit of not admitting defeat, and make full use of my steely willpower to run without any physical effort, but this situation obviously cannot last long.

In the 1/8 finals, Rakitic, who played for 120 minutes and took part in a penalty shootout, fell to the ground during a fight for five or five goals and kicked down William Carvalho who kicked the ball away early. The referee Li Qi called a foul.

Rakitic didn't have time to explain. He felt that the calf muscles of his right foot were violently twitching. He quickly hooked the instep of his right foot forward, and his right hand followed his upper body to break the sole of his foot.

Within half a second, he felt cramps in his left calf muscle again.

Therefore, I could only use both hands to force the front soles of my feet apart.

Anyone with a little bit of brain would know Rakitic's movements... cramps.

Rakitic has rich experience in the game. He quickly greeted the team doctor who was about to enter the court and said not to play. Otherwise, according to relevant regulations, he would have to wait on the sidelines after receiving treatment from the team doctor.

However, the cramps in both feet were really severe, and with the timely arrival of teammates and enthusiastic Portuguese players to help compress the legs, the team doctors did not see it at all. They just ran to the court for treatment according to the referee's gestures.

There are two types of players who cramp.

One is that you can't continue playing after you've finished taking it, and the other is that you can continue to play after you've finished taking it.

Rakitic is the kind of player who can continue to play after being processed.

It’s just that he needs to go to the sidelines after receiving simple treatment from the team doctor.

Head coach Dalic suddenly felt uneasy.

Rakitic had to wait on the sidelines according to the rules of the game before playing, and Portugal immediately had a chance to get a free kick from the backcourt that was long enough to advance forward.

Even if Rakitic can enter the court immediately after serving, it will have immeasurable consequences for the team's overall defense.

In his thoughts, the whistle sounded, and Pepe kicked the ball to William Carvalho, who quickly handed it to Moutinho on the right front. Rakitic, who was standing on the sidelines waiting to come on, was anxious and kept waving his hands. , trying to attract the referee's attention.

If the fourth official hadn't stopped him, he would have played directly.

"uuuuu——"

The Croatian fans in the audience were also impatient and gave harsh boos to the referee Ricci who turned a blind eye.

After receiving the football, Moutinho turned 360° on the spot, shook off Kovacic's defense, took the ball two steps forward, passed the center line, and entered the Croatian defensive half.

Kovacic, who was thrown away, could only keep a safe distance from Moutinho to ensure the tightness of the overall defense.

Martin, who ran forward, took Brozovic and Modric back to defend, but at this moment, he braked suddenly on the spot.

Brozovic and Modric realized it later and reacted too late.

Moutinho passed the ball decisively.

Referee Richie seemed to have finally thought of something, and hooked his left hand in the direction of the substitution technical area.

Rakitic immediately rushed into the field like a 100-meter sprint and ran to his own position on the defensive end.

The football came to Martin's feet, and Modric, who had a low center of gravity, took the lead to push it out.

Unexpectedly, Martin took advantage of the situation and made a pass. The outside instep of his right foot moved the ball to the right, just past Modric.

Brozovic was very aggressive after the captain was passed, obviously trying to catch Martin off guard.

Unexpectedly, everything was under Martin's control.

He originally planned to pass the ball out, but when he saw Modric and Brozovic rushing forward one after another, he decisively broke forward with the ball.

Martin's connection movement was very fast. He had just finished playing with the ball on the outside of his right foot, stepped forward to catch up, and made full use of the flexibility of his ankle to slam the ball out on the inside of his instep.

The reckless Brozovic suddenly felt a cold feeling under his crotch, but his left foot was half a beat too slow, and the football rolled over first.

He was just about to raise his leg to kick Martin down, but he thought that he had a yellow card on his back. If he fouled to prevent Martin from moving forward with the ball, he would most likely receive his second yellow card of the game, and he also thought that he would definitely get it behind him. There were still teammates, so he retracted his half-stretched right foot.