Seven yellow cards were dished out by Mexican referee Benito Archundia in the first half of their final Group G match at the splendid Moses Mabhida Stadium and he could have flashed more in a scrappy 45 minutes that only produced one decent chance.
While no player went into the book after the break, play was broken up time and time again by niggling challenges and fluffed passes and the 62,712 spectators resorted to Mexican waves to keep themselves amused.
"It was a great spectacle, a feast of football. Brazil played very strongly in the first few minutes. After that initial period of domination, Portugal slowly started to control the game, attacking when we had possession."
"We attacked, they defended and vice versa. It was a great game of football and the players played extremely well."
There were high hopes among fans in Durban's bars on Thursday night that the two sides would rise to the occasion and grace the magnificent stadium with a World Cup classic.
"We are here to celebrate our qualification for the round of 16," he told a news conference. "It's a great day for the Portuguese language. Football was speaking in Portuguese."
"You'd have to ask that question of Brazil, not us."
