He’d been on the outside looking in, grumpily glaring through the window of World Cup joy at Lionel Messi, Kylian Mbappé, Erling Haaland and other superstars all patting themselves on the back for electric starts to the 2026 tournament. But now, Cristiano Ronaldo can join them.
Portugal’s talisman put a difficult Matchday 1 display behind him to get off the mark for the 2026 World Cup on Tuesday night, declaring “I’m back” towards the TV cameras at full-time after inspiring Portugal to a resounding win over the mighty - checks notes - Uzbekistan.
In SVQ today, we’ll look at what was a good day at the office for Ronaldo, before casting our eyes over a rather less successful MD2 (again!) for England, with the Three Lions tamed by a Ghana side who scrapped for absolutely everything.
We have an Ask Opta question about World Cup penalties, and the Missing Players quiz takes us back to the 2002 tournament.
🥳 STAT - Ronaldo Scores in Record Sixth World Cup
Talk about silencing your doubters.
OK, fair enough, Portugal were only playing Uzbekistan – ranked 58th in the world by FIFA – but you can only beat what’s in front of you and all that.
Not that many were doubting Portugal as a team, but one fairly significant figure had really been under the spotlight.
Cristiano Ronaldo has achieved so much in football, and his place among the greats of the game is undeniable, whether you place him above a certain in-form diminutive Argentine or not.
Ronaldo has made a career out of rising in big moments. In fact, in his first 43 games for Portugal at World Cups and European Championships, he scored 22 goals and recorded eight assists.
However, things have slowed down for him at recent major tournaments, where before Tuesday, he had just one assist and zero goals from his last 10 appearances.
That included a very quiet performance in Portugal’s 1-1 opener with DR Congo, where he only had 25 touches and once again didn’t score.
Many called for him to be dropped, but Roberto Martínez was having none of it. He stuck with Ronaldo and was repaid with goals against Uzbekistan.