I hope Agostinho gets fired and some one new gets in there. This team deserved to get eliminated, the players were really arrogant coming into the tournament.
Agostinho Oliveira is a Doo Doo Head [R] Who leaves a sub unused when you need 3 goals to progress, AND France was beating Serbia for practically the whole game, it was all lined up but unfortunately we are out of the sub 21 No Vaz Te, Varela was subsituted, Moutinho scored but it was too late. Countdown to when this thread gets deleted. whoever guesses right gets 10 pts
Well its all over folks, at least we managed to end with a victory the supporters in Guimarães deserved, without doubt Guimarães is a special football place, in the end they saluted our players, when they were on the ground crying, the Germans were devastated aswell. Final Notes: 1- The physical condition of most of our players was terrible during this 3 games. 2- The team work, organization, creativity and attacking power was almost non existant. 3- France was without doubt the best team of the group and probably of the entire competition, we could and should had qualified, despite the poor displays we made. 4- Agostinho Oliveira, did a great work during the qualification but he has to assume his share of responsabilities for this failure, probably its the right time to resign. 5- Its time for Scolari to say that he is also responsible, since he said it cleary to Agostinho, that he is the main head in all the NT´s.
Not to take away from your points, but the fact that the WC is played almost at the same time had a lot to do with the condition the U-21 prepared the final stages. Between players on the edge of a full call up to the AA side and the fact that there is a sort of home-ghost apprehention in tournaments played there since the Greece fiasco, it's understandable the way things turned out, unfortunately. That being said, I completely agree that Agostinho Oliveiras term is defunct.
I agree with you but about the physical condition i don´t think there is an excuse, all the teams we faced seemed alot more fit to play, despite the high temperatures, today for instance were 32 Cº when the game started, the Germans should be more affected but again it was us that couldn´t take the heat.
Re: Agostinho Oliveira is a Doo Doo Head [R] Merged to the already existing thread regarding the under-21 team...
Unfortunately, for whatever reason, this team did not equal the sum of its' parts. The individual talent is there, but they, for whatever reason, couldn't put it together. Agostinho Oliveira did an absolutely amazing job steering the kids to this stage, and while he could revel in that glory, he must assume responsibility for the poor showing (at home, no less) and resign, if not be fired. This is extremely disappointing for the under-21 program. For all of the great work that they did in the qualification round, it all came crashing down in the span of a week. What a shame...
After watching the game I can say this. Maybe we didn't deserve to lose, but let's be honest here we didn't deserve to win. Once again Portugal showed us that we only have one plan. Plan A! And when Plan A fails, you go to Plan A! Now if this plan fails, then you move to Plan A! Hopefully by Plan A you have it figured out and can enjoy a victory. Portugal looked the same throughout the whole game. -Yes they had good ball control. -Yes they could pass. -Yes they could shoot on net. -No they can't cross. -No they can't handle a couter-attack. -No they can't score. There is a lot of individual talent, and it shows. What also showed is the arrogance of the Portuguese players. You're gonna take me on? You took the ball off me, how dare you? Why do you guys even bother to show up when we are going to beat you? This is a good lesson for all of you who complained during the WC qualifying that Portugal should score 10 goals per game, oh sorry at least 5 per game. A 1-0 win is a win. Why do some of you doubt that here? Leave the high scorig for the WC when you can surprise your opponent. If you've won all of your games in qualifying by 1 goal, nobody will be paying attention to you. Then go to the WC and pound the crap out of your opponents. By then it would be too late to regroup. If you are playing cards, do you show your opponents all of your cards. NO! If you do show them any cards it is to confuse them or lead them in a direction that you want them to head in. Oliveira showed all of his cards during qualifying. Put a tall guy or two in the crease, the Portuguese will never get a ball. Put one offensive player to can run on counter-attacks and you've got their defense beat. Keep their wingers near the touch line and force them to cross, they'll do it all day long. When they have the ball form, pull 10 men back and that will hold them. Sounds like Greece-Portugal, sounds like US-Portugal, or are these just too far in the past for you to remember them. And for all of you that said Quaresma, Moutinho, Fernandes should have been on the NT. You are the same people that write in this forum that say these people make the team, when they are on the field they dictate the game and guarantee a victory. Even though they are selfish, they can win games. So you had all three on the field and we lost. Quaresma could not read the game. He could run down the field send in very good crosses, but was helpless at anything else. If he really wanted to prove that he was deservant of the NT, he should have used this as his stage to show-up Scolari and to tell him to shove it. Scolari now doesn't have to justify the leaving out of Quaresma after his leadership and performance. Mountinho had spouts of brilliance but just couldn't get into the groove. hE wasn't the great playmaker that he was labelled to be. At times his passes were soft when they should have been hard, and hard when they should have been soft. He did not cover the midfield and allowed the counter-attacks progress when they got to him. At least he got a goal. Fernandes was not the midfielder that he was made out to be too. He was closely marked and made no attempt to break free. He was more considered of defensive action than the offensive. Clearly his head was not in the game. And after getting the yellow card today he should have been immediately subbed for an extra forward. Oliveira can complain about all of the players he had and how he only found out late. What about the other selections. Some of their players wer also chosen for their respective NTs and yet they managed to play, play well and win. They are managed to study Portugal's strengths and weaknesses and use them to their advantage. I never heard Oliveira once say, we studied their play and they changed it, so we had a hard time adapting. What the other coaches said constantly was that they knew how Portugal played and adjusted accordingly. "We let them control the ball and took advantage of our chances." As much as I would have loved to see the cup stay in Portugal, to me this is a good lesson which they should learn from. Scolari learned the lesson from the first Greece game and made adjustments. Oliveira learned nothing. As an aside and maybe part of the other discussion, but it ties into this one. I hope Portugal plays their reserves against the Luxemburg game. This is so that the competition is left guessing as to who really will show up for the WC. If anyone else thinks different, why don't we play a game of Sueca and let me see your cards after they're dealt.
Good points. Cann't argue with much of what you pointed out, really. I do have an issue with your last argument concerning the AA side. Like you said , although it's good and even desirable to leave your opponents guessing your ultimate game plan, I don't think that the usage of the reserves vs Lux. would be useful or necessary at this stage. Trying out a few plays vs actual opponents is in order at this late stage.
I watched all three games and this is what boils down too......poor coaching! I know, you will all jump on me for this but lets take a good look at this. Nelson, M.Fernandes, Hugo Almeida and even Lourenco had no business in playing any of those games. Man they stunk up the joint!!! Nelson is a fast player, but who cares how fast he is if he wasn't never able to take the ball with him? And when he did he would make crosses to nowhere. just awful. Somebody tighten those brades too hard. Manuel fernandes played like Beto. Just awful. Lost the balls tons of times, had no speed and very poor passing. Hugo Almeida, oh my god, the best thing it could happen to Portugal was his injury, too bad it was in game 2 not game 1. Varela had an amazing game, then what happens the coach puts in Lourenco for Manny, which in my opinion should have been Vaz Te who is a player that can come back grab the ball and create his own chances, instead of Lourenco who looked lost at times. To add insult to injury he takes out Varela for Nani Why not take out the LB or even Meireles and put Dani in?? U need to win by 2 goals, lets take out Meireles or the LB and introduce Nani and Vaz Te to complement Varela and Lourenco. This coach was a disaster. His coaching choices and lack of discipline on when choosing lineups cost us the tournament.
Totally agree. What bugs me most about game 3 was that we needed 3 goals to advance and what did he do? start 3 defensive mids It was like he went to the Ronald Koeman school of coaching All he needed to do was to plant Custodio in front of the defense and then choose between Meireles and Fernandes...not all 3. Oh well, better luck next time
This U21 team is full of overrated players who never accomplished anything to deserve half the praise they got.
That's too harsh man. This team has quality players, they just underperformed in an important tournament. Nothing we're not used to.
A Holanda sagrou-se, este domingo, pela primeira vez campeã da Europa de Sub-21 após vencer na final a estreante Ucrânia, por 3-0. The Netherlands won the tournement with a victory in the final by 3-0 vs the Ukraine.