Canadian international Stephen Eustaquio scored as Porto defeated Atletico Madrid 2-1 in Champions League play Tuesday to finish atop Group B.
Brazilian winger Galeno beat Atletico defender Stefan Savic to the ball down the left flank, headed toward the penalty box and sent in a low cross than an onrushing Eustaquio hammered into the corner of the net before being chopped down in a tackle.
The 24th-minute strike was the second career Champions League goal for the 25-year-old Eustaquio, expected to be one of the main cogs in the Canadian midfield at the World Cup in Qatar.
Eustaquio has three goals and three assists in 26 appearances for Canada.
Porto lost its first two Champions League matches this season and wasn’t expected to advance from a group in which Atletico Madrid was the heavy favourite.
But on Tuesday, it was Atletico lamenting a last-place finish and Porto celebrating the group win.
The Porto win also prevented the Spanish team from making it to the Europa League playoffs.
Mehdi Taremi also had a first-half goal for Porto, which won its past four straight Champions League games to take over first place after Club Brugge was held to a 0-0 draw at Bayer Leverkusen in the other match. Porto finished with 12 points, one more than Brugge.
Porto had started its campaign with a last-minute loss at Atletico and an embarrassing 4-0 home defeat to Brugge.
“We didn’t get off to a good start but we knew that we only depended on ourselves,” Porto forward Pepe said. “In the end we reached our goal.”
Atletico had already been eliminated and needed a win to secure third place and a spot in the Europa League playoffs. Instead, Leverkusen earned that berth because of a better head-to-head tiebreaker against Atletico, which finished last in a Champions League group for the first time.
On a topsy-turvy night, Tottenham and Eintracht Frankfurt both came from behind to win their respective games and secure their places in the last 16 of the Champions League.
At halftime in the final round of group matches on Tuesday, Marseille and Sporting Lisbon were going through from Group D.
But instead it was their opponents which progressed as a stoppage-time winner from Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg saw Tottenham beat Marseille 2-1 to top the group and Frankfurt won by the same score in Lisbon to secure second spot on its Champions League debut.
In Group A, Napoli kept hold of first place despite dropping its first points in the Champions League this season in a 2-0 loss at second-place Liverpool. Napoli was looking to become the first Italian team since AC Milan in 1992 to have six straight wins in its group.
However, late goals from Mo Salah and Darwin Nunez ended the Italian side’s unbeaten start to the season in all competitions.
Liverpool finished level on points with Napoli but second on the head-to-head record after losing 4-1 in Italy in their Champions League opener.
Rangers was left with an unwanted record after losing 3-1 at home to Ajax, which secured a place in the Europa League’s qualifying playoffs. Rangers finished Group A with six straight losses and a goal difference of minus 20 – the worst group stage record ever.
Bayern Munich did manage to progress with a perfect record as it beat Inter Milan 2-0 to make it six wins out of six. The four places in Group C had already been decided with Inter having secured second spot ahead of Barcelona.
Benjamin Pavard headed the German side in front in the first half and Eric Maxim Choupo-Moting sealed the win against Inter in the 72nd minute with his seventh goal in his past six matches.
Barcelona ended its disappointing Champions League campaign with a 4-2 win at Viktoria Plzen, which – in contrast to Bayern – fell to its sixth straight defeat.
Ferran Torres scored twice and Marcos Alonso and teenager Pablo Torre grabbed a goal each for the Catalan club. The hosts got on the board with a pair of goals by Tomas Chory.