Germany, needing at least a stage to retain control of their own fate in the championship, started in impressive fashion and just a slight offside by Serge Gnabry denied Gosens his second global goal . He wouldn’t need to wait .
Portugal were penned inside their own half, but initially that did not appear to faze them. Indeed, it almost suited them and they took the lead against the run of play thanks to a superb counter strike ending with Diogo Jota squaring for Cristiano Ronaldo to score his third goal of the tournament.
Yet, Portugal appeared not able to build spells of possession and may just hold out for so long as Germany stretched play throughout the area. The group in crimson would concede two similar aims in the following 16 minutes.
Having supplied so much to the German assault, it only seemed fair that his team mates put on a goal for Gosens, who led home a Kimmich cross to hand Joachim Low’s side a 3 goal lead. Portugal ate into that when Ronaldo hooked a cross from the byline over Manuel Neuer to get Jota to slot house, however in open play that they lacked any real innovation to break the Germans, who sit level on points with Portugal, one behind France ahead of their match against Group F’s underside side Hungary.
Gosens worth the German reshuffle
There have been instances early in Euro 2020 if you wondered who was actually benefitting from Low’s move into three. Toni Kroos and Ilkay Gundogan appeared far too slow to cover the distance they needed to while Thomas Muller, who has seen great success for a number 10 in a 4-2-3-1, appeared uncomfortable as a right winger. Meanwhile the most innovative midfielder from the group, Joshua Kimmich, was dumped wide on the right along with the fact he was such a danger man there made you pine for him to be given the keys into the motor space.
The positional confusion early was typified by Kai Havertz, who found himself as one of the guys asked to defend space in an attacking corner, a strategy that finished with the Chelsea forwards playing Jota after which Ronaldo onside to the game’s opening goal.
The left wing back was battering Nelson Semedo down the Portugal right from moment one. The visiting team had been warned about his late runs into the box after his early volley was ruled out but nobody picked up him on the other hand when he volleyed a cross into the net from an implausible angle.
