Wow, thanks for showing up, Sweden... Slovakia leads 3-0 and scored two in the first 20 minutes. England leads 2-0. With 10 minutes left in those matches, Portugal has to win by at least three goals tomorrow and even that may not be enough.
Yes, thought I could rely on Sweden for a close game, 3-0 will not be enough for us as we already have more yellows than Slovakia and that would be the fourth tie-breaker if we win 3-0. That 3rd goal makes it much more difficult as we need to win 4-0. Our chances have taken a dive.
We need to win 4-1, 5-2, or by 4 goals. ********ing Sweden bent over. That last goal vs Spain really screwed us. I doubt we can do it.
just play a front 2 of Podence and Guedes with Bruma and Iuri Medeiros outwide, Ruben Neves and Sanches in the middle. Make Macedonia commit and hit them on the counter.
I don't understand why you are all upset? We always needed to win by 4 or 5 or more tomorrow because if Slovakia didn't score 3 then Italy or the Czechs would in there game. In my mind the only score that will leave us breathing somewhat easy is 6-0 because the czechs and Italy have the advantage of knowing exactly what they need when they start their games. UEFA really screwed up with this new format, the old one was much better and fair. I think by next tournament they will up it to 16 teams to avoid this nonsense where group C runners up get full advantage of knowing what score they need.
Yes, a 4-1 would makes us go through on the 3rd tie breaker (more goals scored) forgot about that. Also the needless yellow cards that we got in that game that was born out of frustration, a good discipled performance would of opened up the 3-0 option. We can do it, we just have to be ruthless tomorrow.
Was going to mention this earlier, the tournament went from 8 teams where the first 2 in each of the 2 groups goes to the semi-finals to one where there is 12 teams in 3 groups where the group winners plus the best second placed team goes through, which is a terrible idea. Btw Spain got through on play-off so they would (I think) not even been at this tournament if it was only 8 teams. Either have 8 teams or 16 teams this 12 team tournament is just systematically ugly and has hurt us as well, in either a 8 or 16 team tournament I would fancy our chances more.
I'll reiterate 4-1 or 4-0 may not be enough because Italy and the Czechs will be going for broke knowing how much Portugal, Slovakia and each other have scored during their games. If this Portugal is the best attacking u21 team we've assmbled than they better go out and show it tomorrow and leave Italy and the Czechs a mountain they can't climb.
Okay chill, we have a better chance of winning 4-1 than the Czechs beating Denmark by 3, and there is a better chance of an alien invasion this week than Italy beating Germany by 3.
Starting line-up against Macedonia: ONZE DE PORTUGAL: Varela; Cancelo, Tobias Figueiredo, Edgar Ié, Rebocho; Rúben Neves e Renato Sanches; Iuri Medeiros, Podence e Bruma; Gonçalo Paciência To be honest that's the best line up we could have put out. Guedes as an impact sub off the bench. None of the other CM's are good enough to make a difference, and Kevin Rodrigues and Joao Carvalho have been poor. I would have personally played Jota instead of Paciencia (really poor goal scoring record) Mission Impossible..if we don't score two quick goals in the first half we wont be able to do it.
Good line up Jota I agree should get the call but he offers something different to that otherwise very speedy attacking quartet
the other thing we are forgetting is that Germany should they lose to Italy by 3 would then become the second place team and would only be +2....so more focus is on the Czechs not killing Denmark. Hope all this math isn't for nothing.
Hopefully things coming together for Bruma after his development somewhat stagnating or even regressing the past few years. The skill is undeniable. Not only the cracking goals, but his touches have been sublime.