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The recent display of Portugal’s stars versus Georgia was a dismal display of arrogance in football. For starters, there were no stars: they all sat on the bench, and only the living God that is Ronaldo stood around waiting to be served.
His antics increasingly enraged the Swiss ref, even if his shirt WAS pulled a couple of times: that’s part of football, apparently. And it doesn’t trigger a penalty in whatever level you dominate. He eventually departed, to leave the shambles of a team behind that was unable to land a proper attack and played around the (solid) Georgian defence-line, always well outside the 16-meter-line.
It was a match to forget, if you aren’t Georgian. To them, it was a sweet victory and they proved everyone whgo was expecting a disaster wrong.
Yet a disaster it was alright. Roberto Martinez (pictured) decided to “rest” his top players and made eight changes. The A-team was sitting it out, and nothing could sway Martinez to add another Silva or two to the laughing stock that was becoming Portugal.
Having seen this awful display, and also with England’s last performance in mind who also “fought” a football-tiny and didn’t manage to score (in their case matters were worse because they did field what was supposed to be their top team – which is why it is astounding that really exceptional players like Cloe Palmer and Kobbie Mainoo were only brought in when it was too late), one needs to think a bit about tactics, and maybe also ethics and respect in football.
For Portugal to assume that the Georgians were a joke and that Team B would be enough to slaughter them, was an aberrant and haughty assumption that went pear-shape from the very start of the game.
The changes introduced by UEFA over the past five years, which give ‘small’ countries a chance to play at “big” tournaments, are showing results. And the ‘big’ teams better learn fast what that means.
But what I mean by arrogance and a lack of respect…
Source link : https://www.insideworldfootball.com/2024/06/28/james-dostoyevsky-b-teams-lose-spectators/
Author : Paul Nicholson
Publish date : 2024-06-28 08:50:10
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