The entire Portuguese national team at the first training session of Roberto Martinez

The Portugal national football team completed their first training session this Monday in preparation for their Euro 2024 qualifying Group J debut against Liechtenstein on Thursday, led by 25-team coach Roberto Martínez.

In the first training of the Spanish coach, who replaced Fernando Santos in January, all athletes called to the main field of Cidade do Futebol in Oeiras, performing only recovery exercises, are open to journalists for the first 15 minutes.

The players did physical work on exercise bikes and stretching on mattresses spread out on the field in a session preceded by a lecture by the Spanish coach with a group and in the presence of the president of the Portuguese Football Federation (FPF), Fernando Gomes.

The double trip does not count experienced center Pepe, 40, who missed Porto’s last few games due to injury and ended up being left out of the selection list on Sunday, thus reduced to 25.

Goalkeeper Celton Biai of Vitoria de Guimarães, who has been called up for two Portugal U21 friendly matches, took part in this Monday’s match and will also be present for Wednesday’s match.

Portugal will make their debut in Group J of the 2024 European Championship qualification on Thursday against Liechtenstein at 19:45 at the José Alvalade Stadium in Lisbon.

Three days later, the Kinas team travels to the Luxembourgō Stadium to face the local team, also from 19:45 (Lisbon time).

Bosnia-Herzegovina, Slovakia and Iceland are the other teams that make up the Euro 2024 qualifying ‘Group J’, with Portugal needing to finish in one of the top two places to have direct access to the final phase of the competition scheduled for Germany (14 June to July 14, 2024).