When asked about his “I’m back” statement after the match, the five-time Ballon d’Or winner said it was “only so they [his critics] don’t forget – 23 years [doing so] like this”.<\/p>\n
“I’m very happy but the most important thing is the work the team did and the confidence it gives us,” added Ronaldo.<\/p>\n
“Obviously personal records are always nice but my goal is always to help the team achieve its objectives.<\/p>\n
“We had to get through many obstacles during the week but the team worked very well, we improved a lot.<\/p>\n
“It’s been a difficult week, a dark week without kicking a ball, but we dealt with it as we always do because we believe in our work. It was difficult, but we’re back.”<\/p>\n
Portugal will face Colombia on Sunday 28 June (00:30 BST) in their final match to determine who goes through from Group K and tops the standings.<\/p>\n
And boss Roberto Martinez said Ronaldo had been vital in lifting spirits and maintaining standards after the disappointing draw with DR Congo.<\/p>\n
“It was a difficult week because we hadn’t achieved the result we were aiming for and we had a difficult situation with criticism, noise – which was actually unfair,” added Martinez.<\/p>\n
“We were raging, we were sick, but we grew as a team, overcame emotions and have been able to give our very best. Cristiano Ronaldo was a perfect captain, very much focused and made use of his experience because it is not the first time he deals with this situation.<\/p>\n
“Our captain is an icon, he is playing in his sixth World Cup. He is a role model that plays for the Portuguese national team, that works hard every day, that tries to improve every training session and with a great attitude on the pitch and also in the dressing room.”<\/p>\n
Ex-England captain Wayne Rooney, a former team-mate of Ronaldo at Manchester United, told BBC Sport: “With all the other top players scoring goals at this tournament, to score two goals at the World Cup at 41 is incredible. <\/p>\n
“He didn’t have the best game but this is what he does. He’s taken a bit of criticism and this is how he responds. He has done that his whole career.<\/p>\n
“He wants to be the best and he’s always been like that. When the other forwards and attacking players are scoring goals, he wants to top that list. His response here is exactly what you’d expect from him. <\/p>\n
“He’s selfish in terms of he wants to be the best, but he is a team player also. To watch Messi last night and Ronaldo at their age, it’s incredible what they are doing.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When asked about his “I’m back” statement after the match, the five-time Ballon d’Or winner said it was…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":755990,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":["post-755989","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/755989","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=755989"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/755989\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/755990"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=755989"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=755989"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=755989"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}