It was really a disappointing performance from the Portugal team and a bad start to the World Cup competition. Though DR Congo had a strong wall to block attacks from every corner and that was commendable, but it was possible to break through that defense with players like Bruno Fernandez and Vitinha in the midfield and secure a win.
With the current performance, I don't see that Portugal would have a good run in the World Cup this year, accompanied with the current form of Christiano Ronaldo who is not so fit for the runs and finish the attack deserves.
The way you pessi fans analyze football sometimes makes me wonder if you people actually have ball knowledge at all. How can you expect a 41 year old man to be running around the field and doing crosses or creating chances when you have agile and younger players like Bruno Fernandez and Vitinha and Joao nevez on the team C’mon now let’s be for real. Ronaldo is a striker for Christ sake and the work of a striker is to score goals. Those attacking midfielders and wingers had one job to do and that was to feed Ronaldo with enough passes and crosses so as to create a chance for goals but they failed at doing their jobs well and now all of a sudden it’s Ronaldo fault? Get out of here!!
Imagine having some of the best midfielders like Vitinha, Bruno Fernandez and Joao Nevez on your team and they were not even able to create any significant big chances for a full 90 minutes. Even though Nevez scored, he did not meet up to his expectations as a midfielder in that match. They would get to the edge of the box and instead of them to cross the ball in, they will prefer to pass back it’s just crazy!! I expected more from them especially Bruno Fernandez considering that he has the highest assist in the premier league, he didn’t live up to that hype in that match against DRC. Roberto Martinez the coach made some mistakes too and he needs to do better and select players that will perform well to play instead of just selecting anybody. I believe Fransisco Conceicao would have done a better job that day than Bernardo Silva and the fact that he even put Bernardo Silva in the right wing position made me feel like he doesn’t know what he is doing at all. Bernardo Silva has stopped being a winger for a very long time now, he plays more as a midfielder so I don’t know why Martinez put him in the right wing position in that match. And also he should have played Joao Felix on the left wing too in that match because he has a good synergy with Ronaldo considering the fact that they’re both playing for Al-Nassr, he would have done better than Neto in fact.
The Portugal team seriously need to work on their chemistry because it is very obvious that there is none between them. They should learn how to be able to make sacrifices for each other on the field of play. I think this is where the coach needs to come in and talk to these players, let’s leave tactics asides, they need to be sat down and talked to. I was not impressed with their performance at all cos they didn’t play like a big team at all. They were not imposing enough. Cristiano being a senior player needs to talk to these players too and encourage them to put their head in the game so they can go far in this competition.
And for all the people shouting that Cristiano has to step down for the other player to play, you all are clueless. I can tell you for free that if Ronaldo doesn’t play for them, they can’t go far in this competition and I say this with my full chest. In fact they should be counting themselves lucky that Ronaldo plays for them because if they finish playing their rubbish they can always have someone to put the blame on which is Cristiano Ronaldo.
