Croatia play the ball into their own corner, but Modric misses a simple five-yard pass to Martin Baturina, something you’ve never seen before.

Eventually Kramaric creates a weak chance to shoot, but the ball goes wide from the edge of the penalty area. The visitors are struggling at this point.

The crowd are desperate to see history made tonight and they almost get their moment when Ronaldo saves a beautiful back heel from Rafael Leao at full speed.

Although he unleashes a well-placed shot from below, it’s a tricky angle and Livakovic positions himself perfectly to save the ball and only give away a corner.

21′ – WHAT’S HAPPENING HERE?

Ronaldo is awarded a free kick within shooting range and… lets his teammate take it? The ball is dangerously slotted into the far post, but Croatia survive.

18′ – BREAK IN THE MEETING

Another long-range shot was straight at Costa and Portugal decided to take some control of the match, causing a Mexican wave in the stands.

Wow, that’s a laser from Modric. Mario Pasalic lays the ball off to the midfielder coming from far out on the edge of the box and he curls a shot towards the near post that might have beaten Diogo Costa, but it goes just wide.

Bernado Silva gives away a corner, but it leads to a chance for Portugal! They burst upfield on the counter-attack and Livakovic almost has to run to the centre circle to extinguish the danger with a sliding clearance.

8′ – GOAL! PORTUGAL 1-0 CROATIA! (DALOT)

What a start for Portugal! Fernandes is central again as he stalks down the left and has plenty of options to choose from, finding the Manchester United defender’s perfectly timed run with a deft flick.

Dalot had to run away from goal and was followed by Borna Sosa, but he was able to open up his body and shoot under Livakovic to take the lead!

The Estadio de Luz is abuzz with energy as soon as Ronaldo gets the ball, but it is Fernandes who forces Dominik Livakovic into the first save. The ball bounces towards him on the edge of the box, but his shot is not far enough away from the keeper.

Portugal have opted for three extra attacking midfielders and they pass their first test, restricting Croatia in possession before Andrej Kramaric is caught offside.

After a long-winded captain’s talk between Ronaldo and Modric and a moment of silence for Benfica legend Adolfo Calisto, we’re off! Portugal kick off in grey, against a Croatian team dressed in blue.

19:40 – PLAYERS ARE IN THE TUNNEL

Only five minutes until kick-off!

Pepe has retired and Roberto Martinez has dropped Joao Cancelo, Danilo Pereira and Francisco Conceicao and others, with a number of new faces in the squad, including 17-year-old Geovany Quenda who has made just four first-team appearances. But it is a fairly familiar starting XI:

(4-3-3): Costa, Dalot, Dias, Inacio, Mendes, Silva, Vitinha, Fernandes, Neto, Ronaldo, Leao.

Meanwhile, injuries have prevented Zlatko Dalic from playing in the full-back position, so he has changed formation in Lisbon:

(3-5-2): Livakovic, Sutalo, Pongracic, Gvardiol, Jakic, Modric, Baturina, Kovacic, Sosa, Pasalic, Kramaric.

While we are enjoying the battle to qualify for the quarter-finals of this competition, something much more important is at stake for San Marino tonight.

They face Liechtenstein with the very real possibility of celebrating their second win of all time, first since 2004 and first ever competitive win tonight. So keep an eye on that one too…

19:25 – AROUND THE FIELD

Azerbaijan 1-3 Sweden (Group C)

Serbia v Spain, Scotland v Poland, Denmark v Switzerland (A); Belarus v Bulgaria, Estonia v Slovakia, Northern Ireland v Luxembourg (C); San Marino v Liechtenstein (D) – all 19:45 KO.

Friday 6/9: Wales v Turkey (B, 19:45); Saturday 7/9: Ireland v England (B, 17:00 – all UK times).

Not the players for the most part, as we’ve discussed. After hearing concerns about player welfare, UEFA sacrificed additional matchday revenue to increase the number of players going—no, just kidding, they added more play-offs to the rotation.

Teams finishing third in their group will play a second-placed team from a lower group over two matches. The winner will advance to the higher group for the 2026/27 competition.

An exception is Group A, where the four runners-up will face the winner of the group in the quarter-finals of the Nations League in March 2025. These matches will also be played in two legs, and then progress to the semi-finals and final, which will continue in one country as before.

It also has implications for qualifying for the World Cup, but by the time it happens, you’ve forgotten all the details anyway, so we’ll save that explanation for now.

WHAT FOOTBALL IS ON TNT SPORTS?

Any matches falling within the UK Saturday blackout window will not be able to be broadcast live. The blackout window prohibits matches broadcast on television in the UK between 14:45 and 17:15.

19:10 – RONALDO LEADS THE LINE FOR PORTUGAL

Roberto Martinez also mentions a familiar team for Portugal, with a familiar name in attack.

19:05 – MODRIC CAPTAINS CROATIA

He turns 39 next week, but Luka Modric is back in action tonight for a team that has made just three changes since being eliminated from Euro 2024.

19:00 – HELLO AND WELCOME

The Nations League is back, and bigger than ever! And with it, the start of a new cycle in European international football, as the Euro 2024 list is cleared and teams look ahead to the expanded World Cup in two years’ time. In theory, anyway.

But for Portugal and Croatia, today’s game feels more like business as usual. Nothing reinforces that more than the continued presence of Luka Modric and Cristiano Ronaldo in their respective teams, at 77 years old and with more trophies than a Victorian big-game hunter combined.

Portugal were the best team in Euro qualifiers and most of that core are still in full bloom. Modric will be joined in Croatia by Ivan Perisic and Andrej Kramaric, all veterans of the 2018 World Cup finals.

So maybe the next 12 months will be more of a last hurrah and a chance to grab some extra silverware – the odds of making the UEFA Nations League knockouts are twice as high this time around, but more on that later. That starts in 45 minutes!

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