ARLINGTON, Texas — Roberto Martinez confirmed that he is leaving his job as Portugal coach after Monday’s 1-0 FIFA World Cup round-of-16 defeat to Spain, while denying that the result was “a failure.”
Substitute Mikel Merino scored in the 91st minute at AT&T Stadium to see Spain progress to the quarterfinals as Cristiano Ronaldo made his last World Cup appearance.
Martinez took charge of Portugal in 2023, and his contract was due to expire after the tournament.
Speaking in a postmatch news conference, he said it “wouldn’t make sense” to continue in the role, having also been eliminated in the quarterfinals at Euro 2024.
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“Yes, this is my last game with the national team,” Martinez said. “I’m proud. I’ve had 45 games, and I felt welcomed in Portugal, and loved. It’s a memory I’ll take with me always.
“It was a pleasure, a source of pride, and responsibility. It’s hard, but it’s the end of a cycle and in the context it makes absolute sense.”
Martinez coached Belgium before he took the Portugal job, and was previously manager of Everton, Wigan and Swansea.
Portugal had one of the World Cup’s most talented squads — boasting a midfield of Vitinha, João Neves and Bruno Fernandes, as well as Ronaldo in attack — but Martínez denied that elimination in the round of 16 constituted a failure.
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“We didn’t fail,” he said. “We lost a game, against a team that’s one of the favourites. We showed incredible individual talent. Winning or losing is about details in the big games, with big teams…You fail when you don’t try to win, and we tried to win until the last minute.”
“It’s not just Portugal,” Martinez added. “There aren’t many countries that consistently get to the latter stages of World Cups. It’s very difficult to be consistent and qualify always.
“There are things that make the difference, like a ball that hits the woodwork. These are things that decide World Cups.”
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Martinez also defended his decision to leave Ronaldo, 41, on the pitch throughout the 90 minutes.
“When you’re a team and you need a goal, you can’t take Cristiano Ronaldo off,” he said. “He can play 90 minutes, no problem.
“He’s a presence, he opens space, with a deadball situation, anything in the box, it would make no sense [to substitute him]. In extra time it probably would have made sense to use Gonçalo Ramos. But we had to keep the structure, it wasn’t the case to take your top scorer off during the 90 minutes.”
