Cristiano Ronaldo Olivier Giroud Croatia Spain Switzerland Portugal Brazil Japan Morocco South Korea World Cup 2022 soccer Sport cup Cristiano Ronaldo Olivier Giroud Croatia Spain Switzerland Portugal Brazil Japan Morocco South Korea

World Cup Podcast: Korea get samba'd but what is Neymar

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John Brewin joins Mikey Stafford and Conor Neville minutes after Brazil were finished dancing on the dreams of South Korea to set up a quarter-final against Croatia, who needed a shootout to see off Japan.Croatia, who have not won a knockout game in 90 minutes since 1998 will not be bullied by Brazil, who did not impress John with their elaborate celebrations to their first half goals, despite employing Neymar as a midfielder.

Supposedly. They didn't impress Mikey either, because it looked like the Macarena.Can Portugal rise above the telenovela that is Cristiano Ronaldo's fading club career and show what a talented team they are, with or without the clubless one.

If not, they could well be eliminated by a Switzerland team who have added real entertainment value to the dependability with which they have been long synonymous.Spain v Morocco is our last chance of a true underdog in the quarter-finals and it would be a jolt for the first World Cup in the Arab world for the North Africans to do it and they would seem to have the team capable of beating a wonderfully talented Spain who perhaps lack the killer instinct.John gives an update on the hype in England while the lads all rhapsodise about Olivier Giroud, the handsome donkey who breaks scoring records while also performing the role of Kylian Mbappe's emotional support buddy.Listen to the RTÉ Soccer podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.We need your consent to load this rte-player contentWe use rte-player to manage extra content that can set cookies on your device and collect data about your activity.

Please review their details and accept them to load the content.Manage PreferencesFollow every game from the 2022 FIFA World Cup via live

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Portugal’s forward #07 Cristiano Ronaldo celebrates after his team won the Qatar 2022 World Cup round of 16 football match between Portugal and Switzerland at Lusail Stadium in Lusail, north of Doha on December 6, 2022. (Photo by PATRICIA DE MELO MOREIRA / AFP)
DOHA: To Bruno Fernandes, World Cup teammate Cristiano Ronaldo is the most famous athlete in sports.Joao Felix has described Ronaldo as “irreplaceable.”Gonçalo Ramos, Portugal’s new 21-year-old star, has never known his national team without Ronaldo involved in it.A future without the country’s greatest ever player could be a daunting prospect to the up-and-coming generation of Portugal internationals.They aren’t showing it at the World Cup.In fact, they showed they might even be liberated by stepping out of Ronaldo’s long shadow given the way Portugal demolished Switzerland 6-1 in the round of 16 on Tuesday.Turns out there is life after the five-time world player of the year, even if that is hard for some to imagine.Portugal coach Fernando Santos wanted a team “playing with a lot of fluidity” against Switzerland and that invariably meant leaving the 37-year-old Ronaldo — the player with more goals (118) than anyone in men’s international football — on the bench.

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