Phil Neville gave the impression that he was only feeling the searing heat of Setúbal and not the pressure of his job when he said he was “never worried about the five games without a victory” after a scrappy Beth Mead goal salvaged a win for England against a stubborn Portugal team.

A disjointed and blunt performance from the visitors saw them once again struggling to create, but goalkeeper Patrícia Morais’s error allowed Mead to pounce and spare their blushes.

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“Tonight we got the bit of luck we’ve probably not had in the last five games,” said Neville. “We’ve suffered the last five games. We know we’ve got a long way to go, we know we’re nowhere near the finished article, we know that in the next two years we have to really find the challenge from within, the motivation.”

The manager agreed with the assessment that England have largely failed to show they can put in a complete performance over 90 minutes, and when asked at what point the building process ends, he said: “Maybe Euro 2021, maybe the Olympics.”

“We’re building for the biggest stages, Wembley [against Germany] is a big stage next month and we want to perform.

“There’s things we know internally that we’re going to have to grin and bear when we get performances [that] don’t quite click over 90 minutes, but we’ve laid out the plans for the players, we’ve discussed it with them and they know where we are going on this journey.”

With the sun setting behind the Arrábida hills that overlook José Mourinho’s city of birth, Portugal were not to be beaten easily. Switching to a 4-1-4-1 formation, Francisco Neto’s team stayed compact and frustrated the visiting side. It was extremely effective. Neville’s makeshift midfield of Lucy Bronze, Lucy Staniforth and Keira Walsh, dominated possession but struggled find space between the lines leaving Beth England woefully isolated on her first start.

The Lionesses looked a little lost on the patchy turf of the Estádio do Bonfim and with Portugal targeting Alex Greenwood, through Carolina Mendes and Ana Borges, the left-back became frustrated with a lack of assistance from Mead in front of her. With 10 minutes played the home team looked to catch England on their first real break, Lyon’s Jéssica Silva wriggling free of Greenwood on the right and feeding Mendes, who forced a clearance from Steph Houghton.

Bronze struggled with her positioning when England were out of possession but had the drive and knowhow on the ball to offer a threat. Shortly after Portugal’s first effort the European player of the year played a piercing low through-ball to England but Morais read the move and got there a fraction ahead of the striker.

Mead had problems shaking Matilde Fidalgo from her tail until Bronze dummied a pass from Staniforth that allowed the Manchester City player to escape her marker. Mead raced into the box and fired across goal but the stretching England could not quite get there.

Against Brazil on Saturday England had gone in at the break without a goal to show for a strong performance and on the stroke of half-time here they again spurned a chance to take the lead. England found room on the left and popped a shot towards the back post – but Mónica Mendes arrived to clear just ahead of Parris.

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Neville shuffled the pack, pushing Bronze back into her more natural right-back berth by bringing on Jordan Nobbs for Rachel Daly and swapping England for Jodie Taylor.

“Jordan knitted the midfield together,” said Neville. “Beth Mead started to get some joy on that right hand side, Nikita did. [Portugal] tired, which meant the spaces got wider.”

Mead finally poked home the scrappy breakthrough goal on 72 minutes. It was a gift from the goalkeeper Morais, who dropped a looping cross at the near post, leaving Mead to tap in from close range.

It is a win, and Neville will not care how it came. “Ultimately you have to win football games. I’m not stupid, you have to win games,” he had said before this crucial tie. He may have been without a host of key players but this is a squad that should be able to cope and with Germany up next month, in front of a crowd of 77,000 at Wembley, they have a much bigger test ahead of them.

• This article was amended on 9 October 2019. An earlier version incorrectly said Jéssica Silva was the cousin of Bernardo Silva.