Roberto Martínez on Cristiano Ronaldo's experience and Nations League semi-final against Germany
Wednesday, June 4, 2025
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Roberto Martínez celebrates the variety in his squad ahead of a semi-final meeting with hosts Germany in the UEFA Nations League.
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Having previously reached the final four with Belgium in 2021, coach Roberto Martínez is hoping to go all the way as he returns to the finals with 2019 winners Portugal.
Ahead of a semi-final encounter with hosts Germany, Martínez tells UEFA about wanting success for his players, mixing experience with youth and a trying quarter-final test against Denmark.
On the chance to win his first international silverware
I'm not in football to win silverware. I'm in football to create winning teams and see my players win silverware. I've been in the final four already, so I know that the small details are not easy. But we are happy to be in the final four and we've enjoyed the eight games so far.
We've grown a lot. I think it's a competition that allows you to grow a lot. But I'm not in football for my ego. I'm in football to try to see players win titles and I wouldn't want any more than seeing that with the Portuguese team.
On Germany
We respect Germany, they're playing at home and they're the hosts. But if you want to achieve something special – and Portugal has already won the Nations League – we need to be able to face a team that is going to be the favourites because they're playing at home, in front of their crowd. That's where we want to be and we're going to try to enjoy the opportunity of being in a semi-final.
On variety in the Portugal squad
What's important is we've got a dressing room where the experienced players welcome the young players. Because it's very, very different when the experienced players don't open their arms to the new talent. Today, we've shown that this is not a mixture of one generation, it's a mixture of four or five generations.
We've got a player like Cristiano Ronaldo, then you've got players in between with Bruno Fernandes and Bernardo Silva. And then you've got the younger generation and I think you've got a new generation coming in: Geovany Quenda and other players that we've seen in the Under-17s doing a fantastic job.
On a nervy quarter-final against Denmark
Two teams with an incredible capacity for attacking football, taking risks, going eye-to-eye. We've seen two games [in which] the fans made the difference, because I think in Denmark the fans helped their whole team. Our fans really got us over the line [in the second leg], but I think we deserved to win with what we did.
We didn't play well in Denmark, but we were resolute and we kept the scoreline down. That was the difference because, in the second leg, we [conceded] a couple of goals – a corner, a little mistake – but, in general, we were superior.