Advertising
For help, call:
The prestige of the Portuguese national team as a candidate for the next European Championship is one of the most debated topics in the last days of the year, with several media “demanding” that our team be affirmed among the favorites.
The bar was raised when Fernando Gomes, current president of the Portuguese Football Federation, responded in an exclusive interview with the sports daily ‘O Jogo’, when asked about the Federation’s objectives for the European Championship: “The minimum is to triumph in the semi-finals. But what I would like is to be European champion.
Lídia Paralta Gomes, a well-known journalist for Tribuna Expresso, following the president’s light-hearted opinion, published an article on Tuesday entitled “A team that is a favorite and cannot be modest,” in which she tries to explain why our team will have to assume the prestige of favorite to win the title.
“At Euro 2024, an event that will mark the next sporting year, Portugal will be more than a candidate for something: it is one of the favorites, a status that it will have to assume in June, in Germany,” Gomes wrote.
In reality, gone are the days when Portugal fought primarily for a spot in the final round, knowing that it would be very challenging just to get out of the group stage, let alone dream of winning the title.
The first sign of Portugal’s rise to the European level came in 1984. After a 20-year absence, the team, then coached by Fernando Cabrita, reached the semi-finals, where they faced the host country, coached by a French team. through Captain Michel Platini.
In Marseille, at the Stade Vélodrome, France took the lead thanks to Domergue in the 24th minute, but Rui Jordão, one of the most productive strikers in the history of Portuguese football, thanks to the help of Fernando Chalana, some other exclusive talent, equalized in the 74th minute, forcing extra time.
In extra time, Jordão took advantage of a Chalana assist to give Portugal the lead, but Domergue equalised in the 114th minute and five minutes later Platini ended Portugal’s dream.
Another 12 years went by before the Portuguese national team earned another trip to the final phase of the European Championship.
In 1996, the “golden generation” of Portuguese football, made up of the two-time youth world champions (1989 and 1991), made it through the organisational phase but fell in the first knockout match. Karel Poborsky, who two years later would end up signing for Sport Lisboa Benfica, scored the goal of the match that the Czech Republic sent home to Portugal.
Four years later, Portugal survived at the organisational level and reached the semi-finals again, to face France, then world champions.
Once again, Portugal was able to grab a lead, on a goal from Nuno Gomes, but Thierry Henry equalized in the 51st minute. And Zinadine Zidane’s controversial penalty, awarded by Slovakia’s Igor Sramk, for an alleged handball by Abel Xavier, put France through to the final.
Then came 2004, which marked the arrival of Cristiano Ronaldo, at the time already at Manchester United. His debut with the national team on Aug. 20, 2003, at age 18, came in a friendly match played at the Municipal de Chaves Stadium, against Kazakhstan. After his arrival, Portugal never again failed to qualify for the final phase of any major competition, with eight consecutive appearances in the European Championship, and five more in the World Cup.
Consequently, Lídia Paralta Gomes wrote that Portugal “is among the favorites because it possesses, more than ever, the necessary ingredients to win, whether due to the abundance of skills or the stability that other groups lack. Portugal will have to appreciate its victory in the European Championship and there are no warnings or bird broths that could threaten to undermine that evidence.
Commentator Tomás da Cunha, a member of other media, from TSF to Eleven Sports, now DAZN, where he masterfully analyzes English Premier League matches, joins Lídia Paralta Gomes on the podcast ‘No Princípio Era a Bola’ of Tribuna Expresso and that Portugal is one of the favorites.
“Portugal already knows how to win. Between the Nations League (2019) and the European Championship (2016), the national team has overcome that mental obstacle, so all the situations are there to go away,” he said.
For Tomás da Cunha, France and England are the groups capable of defeating Portugal.
France, a finalist in the last World Cup where they lost to Lionel Messi’s Argentina, has a quality squad and “the Griezmann/Mbappé duo is the most difficult to protect in the national team. “
England, on the other hand, do not play “spectacular football, far from it”, according to Jude Bellingham, they have “one of the most in-form players today, along with Harry Kane, Phil Foden or Bukayo Saka”.
“If you look at the last few major tournaments, England have been in decisive phases. It’s not unreasonable to think that he can triumph in the final or even win,” concluded Tomás da Cunha.
Lisbon newspaper Diário de Notícias raised the bar on Thursday with an article titled “Portugal is favorite like never before in Ronaldo’s last Euro Cup. “
“The national team is one of the big favorites to win the European title in the tournament to be held in Germany, between June 14 and July 14,” Nogueira wrote. After all, they are the only team that finished the qualifying phase with only wins in the 10 games of the group, and added the most productive attack with 36 goals scored and the least defeated defense: only two conceded.
For him, the key to good luck is in the mix of talents that coach Roberto Martinez has at his disposal. In addition to the “eternal” Cristiano Ronaldo, who at 38 years of age finished the 2023 calendar year as the best player in the world. A good goalscorer, with 54 goals, there is a vast squad of talented players who lately constitute some of the most productive clubs in the world, adding João Cancelo, Rúben Dias, Bernardo Silva, Bruno Fernandes and Diogo Jota in England, and Rafael Leão in Italy. There are also Diogo Costa, António Silva, Gonçalo Inácio and João Neves, teenagers who are still playing in Portugal, but who have already been known and targeted to sign for some European giants.
For seven seasons, 50-year-old Spaniard Roberto Martínez led the Belgium national team, which from September 2018 to February 2021was considered the best in the world. And at the start of the World Cup in Qatar, the Belgians were number 2 in the FIFA rankings, but failed to get out of the group stage. As a result, Martinez resigned and in January 2023 was appointed Portugal’s coach, replacing Fernando Santos.
His leadership in the national team has been impeccable, as Portugal won all 10 qualifying matches, conceding just two goals, to 36 scored. But for some observers, Portugal benefited from being in a very uncompetitive group. The European Championship in Germany will be something of a litmus test as Martinez continues to search for the first foreign name of his career.
Perhaps due to the ease of qualifying for Euro 2024, bookmakers place England, France, Germany and Spain ahead of Portugal on the list of favourites.
Ryan Dabbs, on the website “fourfourtwo. com”, puts Portugal in 5th position.
“The Euro 2016 winners are certainly a strong side, too, with the likes of Bruno Fernandes, Bernardo Silva, Ruben Dias and João Felix all featuring in a very strong squad. Whether they’re coherent enough as a team is another question, though, while the jury’s still out on whether Roberto Martinez is good enough to lead Portugal to only their second international trophy in history,” was the explained provided by Dabbs to justify selecting England, France, Germany and Spain as the main favorites.
But Luis de los Angeles Fuente, coach of the Spanish national team, has also placed Portugal among the contenders for the title for Euro 2024.
“We have to fight for the win. There are groups that are at the same point as us and are in the same situation. The technique we have to take is to fight to win, just like the other big groups that will be there. “such as France, England, Germany, Portugal, Italy and Croatia,” de los angeles Fuente told flos angelesshscore. pt.
The “777score. com” expressed a similar opinion, publishing the headline “Portugal favourites like never before in Ronaldo’s last European Championship”.
After talking about Portugal’s unrivaled fortunes in qualifying, he highlighted the number of standout stars that Roberto Martínez has at his disposal.
“After all, these are enough arguments for Portugal to try to repeat the feat achieved in 2016, and now the prestige with which they arrive at Euro 2024 is far superior to the one with which the Portuguese national team started 8 years ago for Euro 2024. tournament organized in France,” he said.
Last week, in an interview with Sport TV, Roberto Martinez asked, unsurprisingly, if he sees Portugal as one of the favourites.
“During the qualifiers, our national team earned the respect of other organizations. It’s an herbal process,” Martinez responded. “There are no favourites in the European Championship. There is an organisation of organisations that have a point to try to fight for the name and it is up to us to be in this organisation.
“The European Championship is a tournament where games are decided in the details,” he added. “It is a satisfaction for us to know that we have a team that is ready to give everything for our jersey. We’re going to give it our all.”
Bernardo Silva, considered by many the most productive Portuguese player of the moment, confessed in an interview with the newspaper O Jogo that winning the name is the great dream.
“Of course,” Bernardo Silva said.
“We have to aim for the highest and the highest is to win the European Championship,” he stressed, adding that in Germany the team will “try to go as far as possible, which is to win. We have that goal.”
“We will do everything we can to try and win,” Bernardo Silva concluded. “We’ve won the Nations League, but it’s not as important as a European Championship or a World Cup. We have to bring this joy to Portugal.
This article made the impression in The Herald News: Calls grow for Portugal to become favorites for Euro 2024
Advertising
Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertising
Advertising
Advertising
Advertising
Advertising
Advertising
Advertising
Advertising