Portugal vs Croatia Prediction: Portugal to win but not in 90 Mins

Portugal have made the knockout rounds yet again but will be facing a tough Croatia side who are no strangers to knockout games themselves.  The game starts at midnight on Thursday night/Friday morning and is live on BBC One.  

Jamie Pacheco thinks Portugal will go through but not after 90 minutes, while they may also just get more cards than their opponents. Let's check out his Portugal vs Croatia Predictions here on Betfred Insights...

Portugal  

The jury is still out regarding this Portugal side.  

They were poor against DR Congo and a bit lacklustre against Colombia – both draws – while their big win over Uzbekistan was probably no more than was expected for a team like them.  

Failure to beat Colombia meant failure to top the Group and if they beat Croatia here, their 'punishment' is a likely Last 16 game against Spain, who are up against Austria next.  

One thing is for sure: they're going to have to make better use of their possession because at the moment there's a lot of pretty passing going on but not much of a cutting edge.  

Ronaldo is likely to play, but the critics continue to question whether that's the right move.  

Likely XI: Costa, Cancelo, Dias, Veiga/Araujo, Mendes, J. Neves, Vitinha, Fernandes, Leao/Felix, Neto, Ronaldo.  

Croatia  

As ever, Croatia are bigger than the sum of their parts and after a 4-2 loss to England first up, they did what they had to, beating Panama 1-0 and Ghana 2-1 to book their place in the next round.  

And as ever, Luka Modrić has been playing his part, playing the full 90 minutes in their last game and still dictating play at the age of 40. Alongside him will be his long-term midfield partner Mateo Kovačić, and the pair of them are two of the four players in the squad with over 100 caps to their name, Andrej Kramarić and Ivan Perišić being the others, so there's no shortage of experience here.  

We know what we're going to get from them: solid at the back, physical and competitive. But it's not always so easy to see where their goals are going to come from with no prolific attacker in the side.  

Likely XI: Livakovic, Stanisic, Pongracic, Sutalo, Kovacic, Modric, Vlasic, Baturina, Sucic, Budimir, Perisic.  

*You can check out all of the live World Cup Odds across all of our markets over on betfred.com

Match Winner Odds 

Portugal are 4/5 to win in 90 minutes with Croatia 18/5 and the draw 13/5.  

So pretty much what we expected. 

Portugal have a good record in this fixture with six wins, three draws and just the one defeat in a friendly a couple of years ago.  

The only time they played each other at the Euros/World Cup, it was a 0-0 draw after 90 minutes with Portugal eventually winning thanks to a late Ricardo Quaresma goal in extra time.  

The draw would be my pick of the three because Portugal rarely forces the issue to win one of these in 90 minutes. 

But we can do better than that. Portugal have a decent record of 5/8 when it comes to winning penalty shootouts across Euros, World Cups, Nations League and one Confederations Cup appearance so that needs to be kept onside at 12/1. But we'll also include the Portugal win after extra time, which is exactly what happened back in 2016.  

*You can bet on this match and check out all of our Portugal vs Croatia Odds and Betting Markets over on betfred.com

Team with most bookings points  

Portugal picked up eight cards in their six qualifying games, while Croatia picked up six in eight; Portugal also picked up a red card when Ronaldo was sent off against Ireland.    

So there's some proof that Portugal have been more undisciplined over the last year or so and that trend has continued at this World Cup where they have four yellows to Croatia's two.  

So one has to question why Portugal are 7/4 outsiders here when they're not afraid to take one for the team, while the likes of Ronaldo and Bruno Fernandes often get cards for dissent or displays of frustration. Let's see.