Belgium and Portugal play out uninspiring friendly draw

A 0-0 draw looked unlikely early on as both sides threatened inside five minutes, but the early zest shown proved to be something of a false dawn as the tempo soon dropped considerably.

There were glimpses of nice link-up play between the likes of Eden Hazard and Dries Mertens for the hosts, but that was interspersed with periods of sloppinness that saw both sides surrender position cheaply.

Joao Moutinho came the closest to breaking the deadlock in the first half as his low effort from range forced Thibaut Courtois into an unconvincing save, before Yannick Carrasco fired just wide at the other end.

Portugal grew into the game as the half went on, with Bernardo Silva and Gelson Martins both threatening, before Gonçalo Guedes curled narrowly wide from a Silva cut-back just secondd before the break.

With that, the two sides went in level at the half and that didn't really look like changing after the interval.

Jan Vertonghen made history on the night as he became the first Belgian to win 100 caps for his country and he almost marked the occasion with a goal when he saw a powerful curling effort parried away by Beto 10 minutes after the restart.

There were a couple of injury worries for Belgium as the game moved into the second period, with Vincent Kompany withdrawn after appearing to tweak something in a challenge with Martins, before Courtois had his hand trod on by substitute Ricardo Quaresma.

In terms of chances there remained little to write home about, with Martins only managing to loop a good chance over the bar after meeting Silva's cut-back from the right, whilst Thomas Meunier's cross-shot was well dealt with at the other end.

As is so often the case with international friendlies, the game became disjointed due to the number of substitutions made, whilst Portugal suffered a blow late on as Beto appeared to sustain a hamstring injury in the dying minutes.

Portugal will take on Algeria on on Thursday as they continue their World Cup preparations, whilst Belgium will face Egypt a day earlier.

 

June 2, 2018