Anyone hoping to watch Erling Haaland and Cristiano Ronaldo share a pitch for 90 minutes at Oslo’s Ullevaal Stadion would have been disappointed to see the latter start on the bench, but it took nothing away from a contest that was played at a high tempo from the start.
Joao Neves headed over the crossbar in the 13th minute as he hunted a goal on his 22nd birthday, before Haaland was denied by the legs of Diogo Costa moments later.
The Norway striker was left rueing that miss when Joao Felix calmly slotted Portugal into a 17th-minute lead from the edge of the box, as the forward followed his winning goal in last Thursday’s 1-0 victory over Wales with his ninth successive international strike that was the first or last of each respective game.
Haaland could have equalised when Costa parried the ball into his path, but he was thwarted by an incredible diving block from his Manchester City teammate Ruben Dias.
Norway continued to push, and Costa saved a pair of Haaland headers, while Sander Berge also nodded wide, as Portugal kept a first-half clean sheet for the sixth successive game.
Haaland would not be denied his customary goal, though, and he equalised from close range six minutes into the second half to take his tally to 65 in 57 Norway games, ensuring he has now scored in 16 of his last 17 competitive international appearances.
However, Nyland handed the initiative back to Portugal within three minutes as he passed the ball straight to Ramos to lob his 12th international goal into an empty net.
The goalkeeper made another error five minutes later when he let Ramos beat him to a through ball, with the striker finishing into the empty net, but the goal was ruled out for offside.
The contest became increasingly frantic as full-time approached, but Portugal held on to move top of Group A4 after starting a Nations League campaign with back-to-back victories for the fourth time in five attempts.
The Selecao das Quinas have now won seven of their last 10 games (D2, L1), including their opening two under new boss Jorge Jesus. Meanwhile, Norway remain on three points after two matches, with this defeat their ninth in 12 head-to-heads (W1, D2).
Flashscore Man of the Match: Diogo Costa (Portugal)
