{"id":67349,"date":"2025-06-05T04:01:08","date_gmt":"2025-06-05T04:01:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/?p=67349"},"modified":"2025-06-05T04:01:08","modified_gmt":"2025-06-05T04:01:08","slug":"portugal-edge-germany-2-1-to-reach-nations-league-final","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/2025\/06\/05\/portugal-edge-germany-2-1-to-reach-nations-league-final\/","title":{"rendered":"Portugal Edge Germany 2-1 to Reach Nations League Final"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Oluwamayowa Fakande<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Cristiano Ronaldo scored his 137th international goal as Portugal came from behind to defeat Germany 2-1 and book a place in the UEFA Nations League final.<\/p>\n<p>The 40-year-old captain sealed the comeback in the 68th minute, tapping in Nuno Mendes\u2019 low cross to complete the turnaround and set up a final clash against either France or Spain.<\/p>\n<p>Germany had taken the lead early in the second half through Florian Wirtz, who headed home in the 48th minute after a clever lofted pass from Joshua Kimmich on his 100th international appearance.<\/p>\n<p>The goal sparked controversy, as Portugal believed German debutant Nick Woltemade had obstructed defender Ruben Dias in the build-up. Despite a VAR review and pitchside check, the goal stood.<\/p>\n<p>Portugal responded strongly. Substitute Francisco Concei\u00e7\u00e3o leveled the score in the 63rd minute with a brilliant solo effort, just five minutes after coming on.<\/p>\n<p>He picked up the ball near the right touchline, dribbled past defenders, and curled a superb finish past Marc-Andr\u00e9 ter Stegen.<\/p>\n<p>Ronaldo then struck the winner, arriving unmarked in the box to convert Mendes&#8217; pass. The goal marked yet another historic milestone in his illustrious international career.<\/p>\n<p>Germany nearly forced extra time in the closing minutes, but Karim Adeyemi&#8217;s shot struck the post.<\/p>\n<p>Portugal, winners of the inaugural Nations League in 2019, now aim for a second title.<\/p>\n<p>The final will be played on Sunday in Munich, following the second semi-final between France and Spain on Thursday in Stuttgart.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Oluwamayowa Fakande Cristiano Ronaldo scored his 137th international goal as Portugal came from behind to defeat Germany 2-1 and book a place in the UEFA Nations League final. The 40-year-old captain sealed the comeback in the 68th minute, tapping in Nuno Mendes\u2019 low cross to complete the turnaround and set up a final clash [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":67350,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[175],"tags":[59],"class_list":["post-67349","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-featured"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67349","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=67349"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67349\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":67351,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67349\/revisions\/67351"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/67350"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=67349"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=67349"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=67349"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}