PSG trio Achraf Hakimi, Gianluigi Donnarumma and Ousmane Dembele have all been part of the Ballon d’Or conversation for some time, but not Nuno Mendes – surely that changes after another attacking and defensive masterclass in Portugal’s Nations League final penalty shootout win over Spain.
Mendes shut down Liverpool superstar Mohamed Salah in the Champions League, grabbing the attention of football fans trapped in a Premier League bubble. He followed that with impressive displays against Aston Villa and Arsenal, containing Bukayo Saka in the semi-finals – not just locking down world-class wingers but offering a constant attacking threat as well.
He has it all. The perfect modern full-back with a lovely balance of old-school defensive grit and explosive forward play. He was excellent again on Sunday night up against the imperious teenager Lamine Yamal.
Going into the Nations League final, it was all about Yamal – fresh from a statement performance against France and the aforementioned Dembele in a match loaded with Ballon d’Or subtext. The 17-year-old was billed as the next to dazzle, but instead became the latest winger shackled by Mendes.
The PSG defender made Yamal look foolish at times, particularly for Cristiano Ronaldo’s goal, when he left the teenager for dead with an outrageous burst of pace. And there was also that sexy drag-back earlier in the second half.
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He wasn’t flawless, but Mendes was still the standout performer. Yamal’s shackling owed something to Portugal’s physical approach – often the most effective way to deal with a wide player that good.
We wish we’d got Mendes v Yamal in the Champions League final, but instead we got a walkover – PSG smacking Inter 5-0 on the very same pitch as Sunday’s colossal international clash, which marked Cristiano Ronaldo’s 221st Portugal appearance.
Yamal losing the ball actually led to the corner that produced Portugal’s first chance, with Joao Neves volleying just wide. That followed some early work for the Football Cliches adjudication panel, when co-commentator Andros Townsend claimed Roberto Martinez’s side had “got legs in and around Ronaldo”. We’re pretty sure you can’t have legs in Ronaldo.
Spain quickly asserted their dominance as European champions and Nations League holders, with Marc Cucurella seeing plenty of the ball – hard to miss, given the bitter German boos that followed his every touch, that didn’t relent for a whole 120 minutes. Listen, fair play.
Football can be wonderfully simple sometimes. Spain’s plan to repeatedly find Nico Williams on the left was working nicely, with Joao Neves – for some reason playing at right-back – getting exposed far too often.
Martin Zubimendi opened the scoring with a close-range finish, but the move started all the way back in Spain’s half with a gorgeous flick from Mikel Oyarzabal, who set the Arsenal-linked midfielder free to charge upfield and finish into an empty net.
But our man Mendes hit back with a thunderous equaliser – drilled low and hard across Unai Simon. In real time, Ronaldo looked miles offside, but he wasn’t. Even if he had been, Andros Townsend wasn’t having it anyway, insisting there were “too many phases of play” and that the pass to Ronaldo was “a good minute before the goal” for it to be relevant. It was 15 seconds.
Yamal’s battle with Mendes was overshadowed by the presence of Cristiano Ronaldo, with the media obsessed with the ‘passing of the torch’ narrative in the build-up. That did at least quieten the increasingly tiresome ‘Ronaldo makes Portugal worse’ line – which might be true, but it is boring and we don’t want to talk about it anymore.
Ronaldo actually led the line relatively well, producing a few tidy touches with his back to goal. One that didn’t quite reach Bernardo Silva – who tried to buy a cheap foul – led directly to Spain’s second goal just before half-time, brilliantly finished by Oyarzabal.
Fittingly, just when it looked like he was fading into the abyss, Ronaldo popped up in classic later-years fashion to poke home from close range. But it was all about Mendes – again – with a devastating burst that left Yamal for dead before his deflected cross led to the goal.
From that point on, Portugal looked the more likely. Their left side became far more dangerous with the introduction of Rafael Leao, whose pace, trickery, positivity and strength absolutely terrified Oscar Mingueza and injected fresh life into the attack.
Martinez’s men mirrored Spain’s earlier Zubimendi-to-Williams approach (no wonder Arsenal want both), isolating Leao against the Spanish right-back. It was one of several excellent tactical tweaks from Martinez, whose side were comfortably the better team after half-time, having been dominated in the opening 45 minutes.
Extra time it was, which we were absolutely delighted about. Ronaldo was off after running out of gas, and a leggy Yamal lasted until half-time and definitely came out second best in his battle with Mendes.
There were a few moments of chaos before a nervy shootout: Pedro Porro almost scored from 60 yards, Nelson Semedo missed a sitter by kicking the ball into his own foot – denying Mendes a well-earned assist – and Luis de la Fuente made two substitutions less than two minutes into extra time. Surely that was a reaction to how Portugal had set up, because he could’ve done it during the break.
It was a cracker of a match, with Spain finishing extra time the stronger, and while we were more than happy to get the full 120 minutes, deciding the trophy on the lottery of a penalty shootout still felt a bit unjust. Thankfully, the better team – featuring the best player on the pitch – won in the end, with Diogo Costa denying Alvaro Morata in the shootout to seal a 5-3 win.
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