Former Sporting player scores and stuns Germany (video) | OneFootball

After taking just one point from two games, there was very little hope that Ecuador would make it through. However, the Ecuadorians showed why they are considered one of the best teams in South America. For only the second time in their history, after the 2006 World Cup, Ecuador came through the group stage in style, and one of the standout performers is, without a doubt, Gonzalo Plata.

It was in the 77th minute that the former Sporting player completed Ecuador’s comeback against Germany, after Nilson Angulo had equalised in the ninth minute, in a match where they fell behind as early as the second minute following a goal by Sané.

In this way, Plata — who had already faced Diomande at the World Cup — scored for the first time on the biggest stage in world football, making it 2-1 against none other than the mighty Germany and securing qualification for the South Americans in third place.

At the end of the match, the current Flamengo player admitted that this qualification means even more to the whole team, precisely because of the criticism they faced in the first two games: “Today we experienced it differently, because we suffered a lot in the first two matches,” the winger admitted.

“Maybe it’s better this way, it was an important lesson for us, and now we’re going into the next phase even hungrier for success. This team has enormous belief in its own strength. We have 26 players who will give everything for Ecuador,” he assured.

Watch the goal:

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇵🇹 here.