Wonder what French fans think of their manager, maybe need to get a perspective
Internationals September (Nations League + Friendlies) | England RELEGATED
- Thread starter Samid
- Start date
Leao from the start and Jota at CF and Portugal win comfortably...
Jorge Jesus for me.
I don’t care what anyone says he is a brilliant coach. Both attacking wise and defensive.
I don’t care what anyone says he is a brilliant coach. Both attacking wise and defensive.
Ronaldo is so incredibly past it. Sad to see
Jorge Jesus and Abel Ferreira are the two favorites to assume the Brazilian Nt after the world cup. Unless Guardiola takes the job, what is unlikely.
I wish Tite stayed on for another cycle. Best coach we had in years.
I suspect he doesn't follow european football in detail. Apparently he is not aware of the actual status of Fred. He thinks if Fred is Man United player he should start ahead of Bruno Guimaraes.
Its a off topic.
That’s being ignorant.
No he did not have a good game. in fact not one player from the midfield up did.
Mendes and Danilo were our best players….go figure. That has to do with the coach.
Ronaldo is most likely the greatest player the game has ever seen but he’s also 38 soon and Obviously can not carry Portugal single handedly as he has done his whole career. He was poor today and in fact has been poor all season. Can he still score goals? Of course nobody in history scores more but we also have to realize that Father Time is finally catching up to the great one.
Norway is the most predictable national side around, i knew it, i just knew it, going into this game it would be a loss.
When the pressure is on, the players will not show up, not even Haaland.
But, its been that way for about 20 years, so its not about individual players.
When the pressure is on, the players will not show up, not even Haaland.
But, its been that way for about 20 years, so its not about individual players.
Bernardo always looks a bit crap for Portugal, the RW doesn't suit him because Portugal are not as attacking as City. Personally I would put him into AM and have him rotate with Bruno.
I'd play Leao - Felix - Jota. Jota doesn't create as much but Leao and Felix will, with Bernado in behind that's a lot of technical ability in the team, while leaving the choice to have 2 solid midfielders in behind. It's a shame Santos didn't test it out which means it probably won't happen, but in terms of all round technical ability that front 4 would be as good as any other national team, barring maybe Brazil.
Carried them his whole career even though he wasn’t even their best or even second best player at the tournament they actually won and played virtually no part in their biggest win. Makes perfect sense, your obsession isn’t showing through at all there.
They’ll be wishing they had a more positive and forward thinking coach I’d imagine.
Qatar will be very interesting, this is the first time in a while I feel South American sides might just edge the Euro giants.
The NT equivalent of Micky Mouse cup.
Never thought i would say this but we actually miss players like Marcus Berg and Andreas Granqvist in the team.
As uninspiring a player as he was, Marcus was strong and could help teammates find space to work in, now we just move the ball around looking for spaces to just create themselves.
Granqvist was nothing special either but had a really good partnership with Lindelöf, it just worked and we looked pretty solid most of the time.
Not necessarily.
Playing positive/forward football doesn't equal to winning or challenging for trophies, and fans want to win for the most part.They won't feel better just because their team lost playing offensive footy.
France 82 and 86 played exciting football, still a very pragmatic and defensive german side knocked them out twice in a row in the World Cup... twice, not just one btw.
This is how it is, for big nations it's all about winning, not winning when you are favorite it's a failure, it doesn't matter if you played "positive" football.
Playing a "positive" style and still losing is only cheered/admired if you are a medium/smaller side like Colombia,Peru,Chile, Denmark, Croatia,Serbia,Czech Republic, etc.
Look at Cesar Prandelli at Italy in the Euro 2012, played positive football the whole tournament, still got trashed by a superior spanish side in the final, and italian media was shitting on him for the 0-4, and wished he was more cautious.
Last edited:
England doesn't have a fantastic midfield, they can't play offensive/dominating football with that midfield.
They tried it against Hungary at home, and got spanked 0-4, letting a lot of space for Hungary to destroy them with counter attacks due to not having a proper creative midfield.
No, it's due to the lack of a manager who knows how to implement it, not a lack of players. You didn't get spanked by Hungary because you lacked players, some managers just don't know how to implement dominating football.
And besides, there are many ways to play attacking football. The 3 nations I mentioned are horrendous park the bus/anti football tactics who aim to make the game a slog and win it 1-0. You can play direct attacking football, a good counter attacking system, possession dominating systems, etc. England 100% have the player capability to play attacking football, Southgate is the one who is incapable of implementing it.
Yeah it's an interesting point and the reason why Southgate was appointed and why he continues to play defensively. He and the FA recognised that Portugal won Euro 2016 and France won the 2018 World Cup playing conservatively.
There's a happy medium though. I think the difference for me is being solid and relying on a great attacker to score a goal only works so far, usually up against poorer or similar teams. Once England lose control of midfield, as they did so acutely against Croatia in 2018 and Italy in 2021, they could only play for penalties. If we park the really defensive / luck-reliant wins, most teams who play conservatively and win tournaments also know how to control midfield. Italy played fairly defensively in 2006, but had a strong midfield unit that could carry them through games and exert pressure against top teams. France were the same in 1998 and 2018. And even with a different sort of squad profile, Brazil and Spain played low-risk but midfield-dominating football when winning in 1994 and 2010.
I can assure that a pragmatic side is gonna win the WC, not the ones people see as "offensive"/"exciting".
Spain looks very toothless, averaging 70% possession to only have 2 shots on goal.
Yes, your right midfield and solid defense is what makes teams WC winners, not super offensive football.
France played offensive football in the last Nations League they won, they also played offensively in this current edition
Before Denmark scored the other day, they were all over Denmark, and still went all over Denmark in the second half making Kasper Schmeichel Man of the Match.
I watched the game, not just SofaScore.
Portugal and England are another different beast, who play defensive even against average teams at home.
Not true. Prandelli gained a lot of credibility and credit with just making the final. Nobody shat on him for losing. There wasn't even any real criticism, the closest we came was cold analysis of what we could have done differently, and in the end that always ended with "we got this far doing that so it makes sense we'd keep doing it against Spain too"
As long as we get either Pogba or Kante back in that midfield, i'm honestly not really worried. I just hope he will put Giroud on the list so we have a good plan B behind Benzema.
I think Griezmann might be phased out during the competition if he doesn't improve. Defensively, some choices will have to be made at CB alongside Varane.
Hernandez, Kante, Pogba, Dembele, Coman, they're all very important players that are very injury prone so luck will play a big part.
I expect them to get to the semis, not sure we'll win it if Brazil clicks.
I agree. Not worried at all about France. I also think Deschamps is a good manager. He understands how to attack whilst being solid; too many people are obsessed with possession football, so can't really appreciate him. This is a man who played a 442, using Matuidi on the left side to balance Pogba's need to attack. That's tactical flexibility, and he used it to win a world cup.
My only concern is he does seem to have slight favoritism towards certain players than others. Griezman should not be starting for France. He doesn't fit the no. 10 role in a 3412 as he is more of a second striker and therefore doesn't really end up supporting the midfield in the way he should. Also due to being the linkman in that system, his movement( which is the key to him being good, not so much lately) isn't effective. Playing a 343 with Dembele out wide replacing Griezman would make the team much better.
People are reading too much into the friendlies and nations league. Outside of Brazil looking good again, I wouldn't take anything too seriously until the tournament actually begins. I'm expecting good things from Brazil, France, Spain and Holland.
Wow, ignorance is bliss. Let me destroy that idiotic statement in 2 seconds.
Portugal would have never won Euro 2016 without Cristiano Ronaldo.
He scored or assisted/had a major impact in every single elimination game leading to the final
G3: Portugal VS Hungary 3-3 ( 2 goals 1 assist)
R16: Portugal VS Croatia 1-0 ( his shot led to the rebound tap in by Quaresma)
QF: Portugal VS Poland (led his team in the shootout when people had no confidence, for example the infamous speech he gave to Moutinho. Look it up)
SF: Portugal VS Wales 2-0 (goal and assist)
***Final he was injured so we won’t ever know what we all know he would inevitably do.
His run in 2016 carried us to the finals when we nearly got eliminated in the group stage. He was in fact the KEY player in every single elimination game , followed by Patricio and then Pepe.
I swear you people hate just to hate sometimes. Do you lot even read what you type sometimes ?
Do you want more examples of his literally carrying Portugal which was a utterly woeful national team for a majority of his career? Because I Can keep giving more and more examples.
Right on, mate.
He wasn’t their best or even second best player at Euro 2016, so how could he have possibly carried them? It’s a nonsense statement.
I love that you’re giving him credit for missing a golden chance against Croatia for which his team mate got the rebound. Your QF spiel is even more hilarious and almost as bad as his cult like followers insisting he influenced the final by jumping up and down on the touch line. The nerve of you to talk about “idiotic“ then credit him as having lead his side to a shootout against the mighty Poland.
I also remember Portugal needing a result against Hungary because he stunk the place out in previous games. All of this in a tournament where Portugal avoided every top side until the final and barely registered a win inside 90 minutes. But is it any wonder you’re coming up with such nonsense when you’re notorious for being an obsessive Ronaldo cheerleader and little else.
Awesome your wrote so much and still failed to explain how a player who had an involvement in every single goal in the KO rounds Leading up to the final was not out best player. Portugal would have been out in the group stages without him.
Croatia was his positioning and awareness which got him the shot which got crossed over the line by Quaresma.
ITs hilarious how I knew you would dismiss the QF vs Poland. Typical of Ronaldo hated/Messi fanboys
You know what makes that penalty shootout point even more valid? In the same summer where Messi missed his penalty and quit on Argentina by retiring for 3 months after he caused them to lose Ronaldo rallied his team together vs Poland.
For other players it’s leadership but for Ronaldo it counts for nothing to you lot.
Typical straw man arguments of people who choose to hate a guy for no reason.
If anyone here legitimately thinks Portugal would have got to the final without Ronaldo please start watching another sport because you simply don’t understand the sport of football.
You can reply with any statements you wish to make up but the fact will still stand….Cristiano Ronaldo had a direct involvement or a goal and assist in every single elimination game in Euro 2016 (3 goals 2 assists in 4 games (along with causing the winning goal vs Croatia). Point blank period.
You really need to grow up lad. The lengths you go to are borderline creepy. Bringing Messi into more or less makes it null and void, I mean who cares about Messi here, why the obsession?
Oh you knew I’d laugh at your hysterical Poland statement? Well yeah of course, most would because it’s hilarious. What could be more embarrassing and warped than claiming a goal or assist in every knockout round when he had no goal or assist vs Poland, Croatia, or France in final itself; so essentially nothing in 3 of the 4 knockout games, a goal against Wales was his contribution.
How many thousands of posts have you made on here blowing smoke up his arse rewriting history whilst actually trying to condescend posters who aren’t blinded by a school girl crush? I think it might be time to look inward and ask yourself why you have the rep you have.
Surely the tournament's second highest goal scorer and second highest assist maker would have made some important contributions to the team.
Technically (UEFA wise, so official) Ronaldo made the assist vs Croatia and another assist vs Wales. They were involuntary assists as he tried to score and not pass but they count as assists.
Rewriting history ? Says the game conveniently leaving out the Hungary game which was a elimination game for Portugal.
Then this same guy who said I am rewriting history says Ronaldo didn’t get a goal or assist vs France. Ahh yes you mean the game he was subbed off in in the first half with a injury ? What a clown statement.
The Poland game does not count in your head but many others will disagree just like your attempt to not count his contribution vs Croatia. It’s sad at this point. Also messi was brought up to validate even more Ronaldo’s influence in the Poland game. The way he did was Messi was unable to that season was simply an example of how important leadership is.
My rep here? Mate I have a very good relationship with many posters here and I’ve had many here tell me how much they enjoy my football related posts especially since most of my time on the forum is not discussing Ronaldo.
The sad thing is that the fact I am a Sporting fan and Portuguese the immediate conclusion is “ohh he is a super fan and his opinion does not count”. Which I find hilarious because when I have discussed the never ending debate I always hold Messi in high regard in constantly put him in my top 2.
But sure continue your statement arguments. Like I said direct involvement in every single goal scored leading into the final, without him Portugal are out in the group stages. If that is not carrying your country on your back I don’t know what is.
Stop writing rubbish. I'm not going to defend his current form but to deny his influence in the Euro 2016 win is just stupid. The fanboys are annoying but reading this type of crap is laughable to put it mildly. You talk about @SportingCP96 being a fan boy but you clearly have an agenda. Nothing you write besides his current form is objective.
Ronaldo in semi-finals helping Portugal secure some silverware. And doing it twice.
In 2019:
In 2016:
In 2019:
In 2016:
I couldn't care much about diminishing/boosting Ronaldo's contribution to Euro 2016, but saying he carried the team is just imo outright disrespectful to the rest of the players. Not to mention stupid as all those games are easily available to watch and see it's simply not true for his overall play. Why isn't it enough to just say he had some important moments and made a solid overall contribution?.
It’s just a complete lot of nonsense perpetuated by fantasists with an obvious agenda, some of whom have been pushing that agenda for years on here across thousands of posts. They’ll be the same ones who insist he’s been let down by United and is blameless in the most recent circus that engulfed the club all summer. Anyway you’ll probably notice folk who make these sorts of absurd claims all tend to have one thing in common.
What one thing?
Ronaldo has such a cult following. I’ve never been a supporter of individuals players myself, just United. I asked my barber who he supported the other day and he said ‘Ronaldo’. I can’t get my head around it, but to each their own.
If your Portuguese on this fórum you can’t have an opinion or say factual or logical things about Ronaldo without being called a “fanboy”.