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18/04/06
1 –
It seems to have been my fate in the last two years to always be far away when FC Porto have played decisive games. For the FC Porto v Benfica game of last year I was in Brazil and followed the game ... by mobile phone, because I couldn't find anywhere that had it on TV. For FC Porto v Once Caldas, for the World Championship, I was out hunting partridges in Serra de Mértola and, through choice, I followed the game by mobile phone again because, however great my passion for football and FC Porto may be, I would never swap hunting partidges in Mértola for a game of football — even if my club could be crowned world Champions. This year, for the FC Porto v Benfica game of sad memory, I was fortunately hunting partridges again, this time in the Beira Baixa region. And now I was in Brazil once more for the 'Title Match' between Sporting and FC Porto.
But this time I didn't worry too much because, having stopped going to Alvalade several years ago — it's the worst atmosphere anywhere for a game of football, with a public that's the most insanely partisan
— it was easy to decide to watch the game on TV and, as I was in Rio de Janeiro, it was the same seeing it there as seeing it from a distance of half a dozen kilometres from Alvalade. I made sure beforehand that the
hotel had RTP-Internacional [the State-run international TV channel], and I was even more reassured when, on the eve of the game, I tuned in to the channel and there was: "don't miss Sporting v FC Porto tomorrow,
here on RTP-Internacional".
So, at the time of the game, I turned on RTP and ... nothing, neither the game nor any explanation. Worse still: they continued to show the commercial for the coverage of the game,
although the game had started and the coverage hadn't. It was then that I realised that the broadcast would be delayed, although they didn't say at what time it would be shown, and once again I found myself forced
to follow the game by mobile phone, via a friend who'd sneaked into the Sporting seats and, a little scared, was whispering stuff to me. Meanwhile, I stayed tuned in to RTP-I, in the hope that at any moment they
might begin the transmission of the game. During this 'meanwhile', I got to see once again RTP-I's editorial line, which only served to confirm what I already knew: it disgraces Portugal. And now that this A Bola article can be read by our emigrant communities in the USA [the sports daily has recently begun to publish a North American version], I would like to send them this message: don't believe in the Portugal that RTP-I shows you — that Portugal that hasn't been around for ages, fortunately. That provincial, backward, musty, Salarazist Portugal, with bell-towers at sunset, fade out to fishermen going out in their boats with little flowers in the foreground, the tacky comedy and musical shows like in days of Ramiro Valadão [former RTP director and presenter], the subservient interviews made by servile journalists to "leaders" of the emigrant community … in short, that Portugal of old that you left behind decades ago no longer exists, except in the brilliant minds of those in charge at RTP-I. For better or worse, it's definitively dead and buried. And it's a shame that the channel that Portuguese taxpayers pay to spread the image of Portugal throughout the world not only does not transmit live football matches that would interest the millions of Portuguese scattered around the globe but also dedicates itself to bringing them a false and depressing image of the country, although maybe [those at the station] would like it to be that way. RTP-Internacional is a channel that's anti-Portuguese, at the service of mediocrity, laziness and the bad old days.
2 –
At around eleven o'clock in Rio I finally got to see the delayed broadcast of the game, with the result long since digested. From what I saw, I was able to confirm, sorry, the justice of the pre-match analysis I made here: that it would be easy to beat this Sporting, or at least prevent them from winning. All Porto would have to do was use the same weapons that Sporting had been using all season: play a containing game and wait for a mistake from the opponent. That's what Co Adriaanse finally decided to do and it's what won him his first clássico and, along with it, the Championship. Sporting had no chances in the game and FC Porto two, and it was profoundly dull. But no one had any doubts about the merit of Porto's victory, with the exception of the inevitable Ricardo [Sporting's goalkeeper]. [Sporting coach] Paulo Bento was at least a good loser.
I was also right when I predicted that FC Porto wouldn't finish the game with eleven men, thanks to the need that referee Duarte Gomes felt to invent two yellow cards in the space of three minutes for
Bosingwa, to compensate for the absolutely fair sending-off of Sá Pinto. And I failed in my prediction that, if they lost, Sportinguistas would blame the defeat on the referee — but only because they had not the slightest reason to complain about him.
For the 'Title Match', between a club from Lisbon and one from Porto, the Refereeing Committee broke with the established tradition of 'geographical impediment' and nominated a referee from Lisbon. The
decision was welcomed by all the commentators from Lisbon, none of them thinking it strange that it should be the so-called 'Title Match' that was chosen to introduce new rules. And when the selected referee got
injured and was replaced by another who was coincidentally also from Lisbon, everyone still thought that it was perfectly normal and healthy, although Duarte Gomes did not have Pedro Proença's curriculum. Yes,
everything normal and healthy ... But if it had been the other way round? If a referee from Porto had been chosen, and if he had been ruled out and the second choice had also been from Porto? Would the Sporting
directors have maintained the Olympian silence that the Porto directors did?
3 –
One thing everyone agrees on: there is no one who could attribute a single point won by FC Porto this season to the refereeing. I doubt whether any other club can claim the same, and that makes all the difference with regard to this Championship and last season's Champions. Unlike Benfica in 2005, FC Porto are not finishing the Championship with all of their last twelve goals scored from the penalty spot or from free-kicks just outside the box. In fact, on the question of penalties, FC Porto — despite having the best attack in the Championship and, unanimously agreed, the most attacking system — have had just one penalty given in their favour. Sporting have had six and Benfica eight. Some statistics are deadly ...
4 –
FC Porto (and this is certainly Co Adriaanse's doing) are also the most disciplined team in this Championship; the team with the fewest cards and the team that commits the fewest fouls. This fact has been the cause of deep disappointment for the zealots of the Liga's
Disciplinary Committee, whose only object and raison d'être, as has been made patently clear, is the disciplinary persecution of FC Porto's players. Without Portistas to punish, the DC stopped dishing out the celebrated 'fast-track' suspensions [decided on TV footage] — which played a despicable part in last season's title — and their excellencies the judges disappeared without a trace. But this week, they returned to punish a stomp by Ricardo Quaresma that the referee at Alvalade didn't see. Blimey!: only in the 30th game of the season did the CD find any evidence for a 'fast-track' suspension, and what an extraordinary coincidence, it was against an FC Porto player!
Very intelligently, the FC Porto administration decided not to contest the suspension, because that would have helped to satisfy the hidden agenda, which was to remove Quaresma from the final of the Taça.
And contest it for what, when it's more than crystal clear what the purpose and objectives, and the absolute lack of shame, areof this Liga organ, chosen by Valentim Loureiro [president of the Liga]
and Luís Filipe Vieira [president of Benfica]? The simple fact that it still exists as it is and with the transparency of its intentions covers its representatives with shame and shows to what extent the titles won
by FC Porto are much more difficult to win than those of the others.
5 –
If, instead of Jorginho, it had been Liedson scoring eight minutes from time in Alvalade, Co Adriaanse would be a loser. As it is, it seems that praise for him is unanimous. A journalist from the [national daily] Correio da Manhã phoned me in Brazil to ask me if I wanted to change my opinions about FC Porto's coach. It's true that here in Brazil the wind blows less, which inspires me less to be a weather vane. In due course, that is at the end of the season, I'll say what I think about the subject. Whichever way the wind blows.
(courtesy Miguel Sousa Tavares)
04/04/06
1 - Somebody wrote in A Bola Friday that "Although at Alvalade [home of Sporting] no one officially admits it, it did cause some surprise that Lucílio Baptista had been chosen to referee V. Guimarães v Sporting ... As he is a very experienced referee, he was thought to be a strong candidate to referee Sporting v FC Porto. In the end, he's going to be in Guimarães ..." In fact, for days a concerted effort was being clearly made by Sporting's directors and coach and Sporting-oriented commentators and journalists to put the pressure on and have their favourite referee for the so-called 'Title Match'. And their frustration, almost indignation, was also clear when they found out that they'd drawn the short straw. While it's always distasteful to witness a campaign to get the nomination of a given referee for a given game, pressure to get Lucílio Baptista for this specific game is simply obscene.
It's common knowledge that Lucílio Baptista is currently one of the worst top-flight referees – you just have to look at the classifications in the papers to see that his name never figures among the top
ones. Apart from that, he's already been chosen this season to referee the FC Porto v Benfica game (what a coincidence!) and FC Porto v Sporting. And he was chosen to referee no less than four out of the last five Liga games between Sporting and FC Porto, or vice-versa – and in all of them, without exception, he prejudiced FC Porto. And then, apart from those duels where he seemed to have a season ticket, Lucílio Baptista has always shown, in the other FC Porto games that he's refereed, an irrepressible aversion to blue and white – as we saw recently in the Marítimo v FC Porto Cup game, and as we saw in the Cup Final two years ago between Benfica and FC Porto, where his double standards clearly influenced the final result. With such a history, you have to have a nerve to think that no one but him would be the best referee for Alvalade [Sporting v FC Porto]. The fact that Sportinguistas made such an effort to get him as referee makes you think about what goes on behind the scenes in Portuguese football.
But if they didn't get him for the Porto game, they got him for Guimarães – which, as someone at the club noted, was as decisive as the Porto game. And in Guimarães, without many chances to shine, Lucílio
Baptista once again showed his worth: he let two penalties go by, one for each side. Only the first was in Vitória de Guimarães' favour, and if they'd scored it, it would have put Vitória ahead. At the Dragão,
in the FC Porto v Sporting game, he'd done exactly the same thing, letting a penalty for each side go by, the first in Porto's favour.
2
- So Sporting receive FC Porto without Lucílio Baptista but with the psychological boost of a team that's in a run of ten straight wins and seven games without conceding a goal, and that has such confidence that there isn't a player or director that doesn't reckon that the title will not elude them. But, as we saw once again in Guimarães [0-1], Sporting's football is insipid and depends on waiting for a refereeing mistake or for a slip from opponents. Afterwards, Liedson 'resolves'. Football like that can be beaten by:
— adopting a similarly cautious and expectant approach and, since it's they who have to win the game, letting them take the initiative to construct, take risks and be imaginative;
— avoiding at all costs any
one-on-one or dubious incident that could give them a penalty or a free-kick on the edge of the box;
— avoiding any word or gesture of dissatisfaction directed at the match officials, however slight or
justified;
— never letting Liedson get more than half a metre away, even if he swears he's only going to the bathroom;
— when attacking, crossing high and into the six-yard box and having at least two
players on hand to snap up the leftovers;
Unless anything really abnormal happens, that should be enough for FC Porto to leave Alvalade as the main candidate for the title.
3
- With these or other tactics, Co Adriaanse once again has a chance to show that he isn't a born loser and that he's capable of winning an important game (out of 11 such games so far this season he's only managed one win, against Inter, and that with a large helping of luck). But judging by the rehearsal last Sunday against a virtually relegated Gil Vicente, what is not so abundant in the team are ideas on how to win games. Adriaanse's highly praised ultra-offensive tactics, with two wingers, four forwards, defenders going up constantly and the great mobility of the front line, have paradoxically produced a frustrating difficulty in getting goals, with at the same time great defensive efficacy, due in great part to the brilliant Pepe. With the players the team has and the options that there are on the bench, it's hard to understand how even at home against ten Gil Vicente players, then nine, the team so lacked the imagination and simplicity to score goals. FC Porto must be the Liga team that scores the least goals from free-kicks (what do they do in training?) and it's certainly the team that needs the most attacks, the most possession and the most shots to get a goal. And if Sporting are Liedsondependent,
FC Porto have spent the whole season depending on the difference that Ricardo Quaresma makes in a pattern of play that's predictable and innocuous.
[FC Porto beat Sporting 1-0]
4
- Tomorrow evening, in Barcelona, Benfica play hoping to continue to feed a fantastic dream. We're all aware that for that to happen, it's going to have to be the great Benfica that played in Liverpool after the half-hour mark, with a Simão that's just as inspired and with the same supernatural luck brought about by Moretto's prayers [the goalkeeper prays into his net at the beginning of games], which they had against Barcelona at the Luz and in the first 20 minutes against Liverpool. In my opinion, the critiques of last week's game at the Luz haven't really helped the players to prepare themselves mentally for the Cyclopean task that lies ahead of them tomorrow evening. Putting all the emphasis on the penalty not given against Motta [handball], and making that an almost diplomatic issue with Cataluña, the critics forgot to mention that a victory through that 'penalty', deliberately provoked and a godsend, would have completely belied what happened on the pitch and would have wiped out, with yet another miracle, the terrible way Benfica played and allowed Barcelona to play. I don't think that hearing Simão say without blinking at the end of the game that "luck wasn't on our side", and continue to bang on about the penalty, as if it had been the turning point of the game and the only factor that decided the outcome, helps the players to prepare themselves mentally for the fact that they're going to have to do an awful lot more tomorrow than they did a week ago. In these big European games, big teams never complain about a referee who's made just one mistake because they know that they have to allow for that and be able to win anyway. What really gets to me is criticism that, because of affinity to club or country, can make a refereeing mistake the basis for analysis of a whole game – regardless of what was true or morally right. The difference between, for example, the penalty that the referee didn't give against Barcelona and the two that he didn't give on Saturday in the Restelo [Belenenses' stadium], against Benfica, is that in the former case the penalty would have given Benfica a victory that they didn't deserve given how they played and, in the latter case, it allowed a victory that Benfica didn't deserve (and hence six points in a row thanks to refereeing mistakes, with not a peep from Sr. Veiga [Benfica's Director of Football] ...). To win in Europe, give or take a bit of luck, give or take the odd refereeing mistake, you have to be the best. That's what Benfica have to show tomorrow evening. It certainly won't be easy, but it's what they did against Liverpool.
[Benfica lost 0-1 to Barcelona and were knocked out of the Champions League]
(courtesy Miguel Sousa Tavares)
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