Proud of the heart that team showed in this match. And specially Cristiano. Play very well in the first half. The he was more than physically impaired. And see him, one of the greatest players that I ever saw, after a magnificent season, when he's been battling with tendinitis on his left knee for over two months, and after Ghana's goal when the "Mission Impossible" became even harder and borderline impossible, he was there making dashes, going for every ball, doing everything that he could to win the game. He wasn´t lucky. Miss too much. But the heart was there. No doubt. He could easily give up and no one could blame him after the effort and the sacrifice that he's been put through. Seeing Beto crying for coming out of the field and force to waste a sub in what the players believed that was a reachable objective was pretty touching. We cannot certainly accused this team of lack of unity and solidarity with each others.
The difference that Rúben Amorim and William Carvalho made in the midfield was huge. Meireles is done. He's lost his legs. The quality is there but the intensity is not. Moutinho looked a complete different player not having to compensate for Meireles’s inability to cover ground. Bruno Alves is the same.
It wasn't a well played game by any stretch, but the intensity and the spirit was great. We leave the WC with your heads high, at least.
Our organization was the worst I can possible remember. We made a tour in New Jersey/New England area, which served no purpose other than to capitalize on the 4 year period when USA fans focus on football and exploit CR7 brand. A “Money tour”. Maybe they should’ve had some rock band open the games for them. Portugal arrived four or five days before our first game to a different hemisphere to play in pretty adverse climacteric conditions. Plus we set our camp at Campinas near São Paulo (South), were the climate is completely different form the north and centre of Brazil (Salvador, Manaus and Brasília), in which we played. No wonder the lack of fitness and stamina.
We can mostly blame the amount of muscular injuries that we have on our stupid preparation. Postiga, Coentrão, Hugo Almeida, Rui Patrício, André Almeida, Beto, plus injuries in training to Bruno Alves and Meireles. Two GK injured in a two week period is to say a lot of our preparation, or lack thereof.
Now the tactics. After a Euro 2012 where we were probably the most rock solid defence at the tournament (the only one that not conceived against the mighty Spain, for example), when we show a high tempo, great solidarity regarding defensive duties and an overall positive stamina levels. We showed none of this at the WCPaulo Bento managed to be more stubborn than Scolari at Euro 2004, when we didn’t start most of Porto’s Champion league winners players (Deco, Ricardo Carvalho, Nuno Valente and Miguel from Benfica). He was clearly that, after the Germany game, we needed other players in the middle (Carvalho and Amorim) and on the defense (Ricardo Costa and Neto when Pepe wasn’t). The combination Veloso and Meireles lack both the pace and the stamina that a 4-3-3 requires. And Bruno Alves, outside his physical strength, aerial prowess and leadership, was only a (barelly) walking stone pillar at the centre of our defence.
The lack of true back up LB prove costly, although I understand Bento’s POV. With Hugo Almeida and Postiga injured for most of the season and Éder coming out recently broken foot surgery, he wanted Rafa Silva to give the team multiple options offensively. Since he can play as an AMF, Winger and SS, he could plug Ronaldo upfront if necessary. André Almeida had a lot of versatility, but he’s most a plug guy at LB. He struggles too much position wise to be a true option there.
We had more than enough talent to come out of this group. USA didn’t show me nothing special other than discipline and believe. In our game against them, Portugal could had the second goal a lot of times, and the US could only be effective when we stop pressure the midfield. They couldn’t really control the game. But kudos to them, for never stop believing in their selves.
This is a culmination of a generation of players, in which most of them overachieve. They honoured the Quinas’ shirt. But I hope that we will get a gradual change over the next two years. Our next generation isn’t really ready to step up (other than a few players) in the next 3 or 4 years, but I think we should look at the model of The Netherlands and France that focused in young players, most of them not really great, and certainly not at the level of previous generations, but that with effort, cohesion and chemistry they were able to form a team in the true meaning of the word and achieve a good WC. I personally never thought that the Dutch would get out of that group.
Sorry for the long post, but that’s my view on Portugal’s campaign at the WC.
awesome build-up in this one, though.
