Will Cristiano Ronaldo Miss 2022 World Cup? Know Portugal's Tricky Playoffs Path Ahead

Serbia clinched an automatic berth in the 2022 FIFA World Cup finals after halftime substitute Aleksandar Mitrovic’s very late header gave them a comeback 2-1 win over Portugal in their final Group A qualifier at the Estadio da Luz, in Lisbon on Sunday. The hosts only needed a draw to finish on top and qualify for next year’s World Cup in Qatar, but Mitrovic’s superb goal pushed Cristiano Ronaldo’s team to the playoffs. Mitrovic beat home goalkeeper Rui Patricio to spark wild celebrations on his team bench. Earlier in the match visiting captain Dusan Tadic had cancelled out Renato Sanches’ opener for Portugal.

A record of five wins and two draws gave Portugal 17 points in their successful qualification campaign prior to Sunday. That streak and their talismanic captain Ronaldo’s brilliance fell short on the penultimate match day and now he will have to sweat out making what will likely be his last World Cup appearance. Now all eyes will be upon the star striker as he gets another chance to close out his legendary career with a World Cup trophy.

Ronaldo looked upset and complained with his teammates after Serbia’s late goal cost him from making his fifth straight World Cup appearance, ESPN reported. The 36-year-old is attempting to make his fifth World Cup, having qualified for the last four with Portugal.

However, the playoffs will be a tricky affair for Portugal as they have to win two separate one-off matches or miss out a trip to Qatar next year. After failing to make it to the tournament from 1990-1998, Portugal have played in every World Cup since 2002. They were once eliminated by Uruguay in the round of 16 of the 2016 edition in Russia.

The 2022 FIFA World Cup playoffs will see 12 European countries – the 10 second-placed group finishers and two teams from the UEFA Nations League standings battle out against each other for a ticket to the World Cup. They will be split into three brackets of four teams each and each of those three brackets will have a single World Cup ticket on the line.

The four teams in each of the three brackets will first play a single-elimination semi-final, scheduled to be played between on March 24-25, 2022. It will be followed by a single-elimination playoff final in the last week of March, with only the winner of the final making it to Qatar.