Day 5 - Round 2: Group A: Czech-Portugal; Swiss-Turkey

Quim

At this moment van der Saar and Saint Iker are the best keepers in the world.

Protheus wrote:

Ignorant, naive tosser. wrote:Another good performance from Portugal, particularly against a team that plays in their style. All things considered I thought that Pepe, Carvalho and Ricardo handled their crosses(our biggest weakness, against their greatest strength.) far better than anyone could have hoped.
Of course, the easier people for MOTM, Deco and Ronaldo deserve their praise, but I thought that Simão was particularly effective in carrying out Scolari's instructions, and probably showed, in this game, why he, and not Quaresma, is first choice.

You've got to be kidding. Simão was horrible and so slow and always wasted the few opportunities he had. Quaresma played without Moutinho thus with lesser conections to the midfield and even so he managed to create a opportunity and scored a goal. It was easy but even so one must be in the right place to score.

And we didn´t play that well. We've conceded plenty of space, look a little lost for a lot of time and the result was better than the performance. We've had our moments but we weren´t very solid.

Protheus, you and I are made not to agree on anything.

Prot

I agree with you on Simao.... he was always a waste of space when i saw him play. How come he is still in selected for the national team let be alone he is "good" enough to start....?

Ignorant, naive tosser. wrote:

Protheus wrote:

Ignorant, naive tosser. wrote:Another good performance from Portugal, particularly against a team that plays in their style. All things considered I thought that Pepe, Carvalho and Ricardo handled their crosses(our biggest weakness, against their greatest strength.) far better than anyone could have hoped.
Of course, the easier people for MOTM, Deco and Ronaldo deserve their praise, but I thought that Simão was particularly effective in carrying out Scolari's instructions, and probably showed, in this game, why he, and not Quaresma, is first choice.

You've got to be kidding. Simão was horrible and so slow and always wasted the few opportunities he had. Quaresma played without Moutinho thus with lesser conections to the midfield and even so he managed to create a opportunity and scored a goal. It was easy but even so one must be in the right place to score.

And we didn´t play that well. We've conceded plenty of space, look a little lost for a lot of time and the result was better than the performance. We've had our moments but we weren´t very solid.

Protheus, you and I are made not to agree on anything.

Nothing personal i guess we see things in different prespectives

Here, have a

Cheers

RicardoJol wrote:Prot

I agree with you on Simao.... he was always a waste of space when i saw him play. How come he is still in selected for the national team let be alone he is "good" enough to start....?

Because he is a team player like a conservative manager would enjoys unlike Nani and Quaresma who have both different characteristics.

Personaly i preffer Quaresma fantasy, but if one preffers Nani speed or Simão team play they give other extras to our game. It is a matter of taste and what the manager likes.

What i don´t agree about the selection is that no matter how bad he plays he is always the 1st choice. He is one of the Scolari "dears". A little bit like Ricardo "butter-hands"

Of course Simão in form is a good player, the problem is that he isn´t in form for the national side for a long time but plays everytime.

PS: He was excelent at free kicks so i am not surprised he is the first to take them. He doesn´t score from fk for long too though.

Ignorant, naive tosser. wrote:Another good performance from Portugal, particularly against a team that plays in their style. All things considered I thought that Pepe, Carvalho and Ricardo handled their crosses(our biggest weakness, against their greatest strength.) far better than anyone could have hoped.
Of course, the easier people for MOTM, Deco and Ronaldo deserve their praise, but I thought that Simão was particularly effective in carrying out Scolari's instructions, and probably showed, in this game, why he, and not Quaresma, is first choice.

Because Scolari likes to prove he's the boss by selecting guys he shouldn't?

Toni Kroos wrote:not impressive, czech were on the same level

Croatia

lampiao007 wrote:Unfortunately, Quim is out injured. So our chances of a better goalie are not famous
Although I would take Nuno or Rui Patricio any day...
Except on a penalty shoot out that is....

You guys and the Ricardo thing...
Nuno or Patricio ahead of Ricardo.. guess you didn't notice the points Patricio cost us this season.

Luso wrote:

Ignorant, naive tosser. wrote:Another good performance from Portugal, particularly against a team that plays in their style. All things considered I thought that Pepe, Carvalho and Ricardo handled their crosses(our biggest weakness, against their greatest strength.) far better than anyone could have hoped.
Of course, the easier people for MOTM, Deco and Ronaldo deserve their praise, but I thought that Simão was particularly effective in carrying out Scolari's instructions, and probably showed, in this game, why he, and not Quaresma, is first choice.

Because Scolari likes to prove he's the boss by selecting guys he shouldn't?

Worked rather nicely so far. Let's have this discussion in 2 years time, IF, we qualify for the next WC

Luso wrote:

lampiao007 wrote:Unfortunately, Quim is out injured. So our chances of a better goalie are not famous
Although I would take Nuno or Rui Patricio any day...
Except on a penalty shoot out that is....

You guys and the Ricardo thing...
Nuno or Patricio ahead of Ricardo.. guess you didn't notice the points Patricio cost us this season.

Pretty much the same ones that Ricardo used to cost you when he was there?

lampiao007 wrote:

Luso wrote:

Ignorant, naive tosser. wrote:Another good performance from Portugal, particularly against a team that plays in their style. All things considered I thought that Pepe, Carvalho and Ricardo handled their crosses(our biggest weakness, against their greatest strength.) far better than anyone could have hoped.
Of course, the easier people for MOTM, Deco and Ronaldo deserve their praise, but I thought that Simão was particularly effective in carrying out Scolari's instructions, and probably showed, in this game, why he, and not Quaresma, is first choice.

Because Scolari likes to prove he's the boss by selecting guys he shouldn't?

Worked rather nicely so far. Let's have this discussion in 2 years time, IF, we qualify for the next WC

Before we get ahead of ourselves, let's try and win the Euro. If he wants to do that, he should bring on Quaresma.

Simao's place is clearly on the bench.

lampiao007 wrote:

Luso wrote:

lampiao007 wrote:Unfortunately, Quim is out injured. So our chances of a better goalie are not famous
Although I would take Nuno or Rui Patricio any day...
Except on a penalty shoot out that is....

You guys and the Ricardo thing...
Nuno or Patricio ahead of Ricardo.. guess you didn't notice the points Patricio cost us this season.

Pretty much the same ones that Ricardo used to cost you when he was there?

Assuming this is true, would it then not make sense to stick with the most experienced keeper that's actually on us games?

Seems logical to me.

Hope we win the Euro on a shoot-out

Ricardo has many short comings, but ever since the guy signed for Sporting you reds have been calling for his head.. and the blues seem to be offended the retired Baia is no longer costing us Poborski-style goals...

Just one thing about Simão, on last nights game, he made 4 recuperations of the ball, mostly protecting what was our defensive weaklink, Paulo Ferreira. Difficult to imagine any other winger in the squad doing that.
And that's what I mean when I say Simão is worth his place in the team, and should play in front of both Quaresma and Nani, especially in the games against the stronger teams. When we play teams like Belgium, then there is space to have two wingers with only attacking in their minds.

Nani did plenty of defensive work for Sporting

But I see what you're saying. Still, I think he's working on his defensive side as it keeps him in the game.. he knows his ofensive game isn't enough to keep the spot.

We haven't mentioned his atitude however. He's not a good influence as he sulks when he doesn't get his way. He's showed his character on the free-kicks already and was clearly upset when he came off for Quaresma. Can't forget the guy cried when he wasn't going to be Benfica captain... true story and ya' know it

I'd stick him on the bench.

The Poborski goal was a great piece of fantasy goal. It was not easy to pick the ball the way he did. There was no possible defense. Since it was the only goal of the game and you Baía-haters chose to forget all the saves he made and only to refer the odd miss it was obvious you would use it as an excuse to drop the keeper that was later on european champion with Porto, the keeper with most trophies in history for a guy that the only thing he had in his favor was being another possible keeper other than Baía. You know Luso, the hate thing that goes high in Portugal. It wasn´t the first time and it sure won´t be the last.
Besides we all know Baía was dropped because of the court action against the FA. From that time and since he was a witness against the FA, his fate was marked with Madaíl and all the leches of the FA.

As for Ricardo he is $h!t period. Only biased Sportinguistas since they have a conection with him (like we had with Baía and Quim with Benfica) will forgive him every single thing. Just because he excels at penaltis that doesn´t makes me blind at how Cr@p and arrogant he is. He is Cr@p and if you watch him without being biased you know i and all the others that criticize him are right.

Quim is by far our best keeper, and he is a Benfica player so you can´t acuse me of being biased about that. Like i can understand when Simão is picked over Quaresma at times as being an option (i do not agree but that is only an opinion i can respect that) the Ricardo case is all about Scolari being stuborn and a brat with expensive toys at his disposal.

Patricio is a good choice for a 3rd keeper. A young one as it should be IMO, not good enough atm for the first eleven but he will be in the future if he continue to improve.

Nuno is there to give a little candy to Porto because of the CL problem and to apease the FA critics. It is not because of a sporting choice we all know that and they won´t throw sand at Porto fan's eyes that easly, the choice should be a Setúbal keeper or something like that. Nuno is not even our first choice for god sake. That selection is pathetic.

lampiao007 wrote:

Luso wrote:

Ignorant, naive tosser. wrote:Another good performance from Portugal, particularly against a team that plays in their style. All things considered I thought that Pepe, Carvalho and Ricardo handled their crosses(our biggest weakness, against their greatest strength.) far better than anyone could have hoped.
Of course, the easier people for MOTM, Deco and Ronaldo deserve their praise, but I thought that Simão was particularly effective in carrying out Scolari's instructions, and probably showed, in this game, why he, and not Quaresma, is first choice.

Because Scolari likes to prove he's the boss by selecting guys he shouldn't?

Worked rather nicely so far. Let's have this discussion in 2 years time, IF, we qualify for the next WC

Simao will always be first choice until Quaresma/Nani make a huge impact i.e change a game in our favor.

EMPortuguese wrote:

lampiao007 wrote:

Luso wrote:

Ignorant, naive tosser. wrote:Another good performance from Portugal, particularly against a team that plays in their style. All things considered I thought that Pepe, Carvalho and Ricardo handled their crosses(our biggest weakness, against their greatest strength.) far better than anyone could have hoped.
Of course, the easier people for MOTM, Deco and Ronaldo deserve their praise, but I thought that Simão was particularly effective in carrying out Scolari's instructions, and probably showed, in this game, why he, and not Quaresma, is first choice.

Because Scolari likes to prove he's the boss by selecting guys he shouldn't?

Worked rather nicely so far. Let's have this discussion in 2 years time, IF, we qualify for the next WC

Simao will always be first choice until Quaresma/Nani make a huge impact i.e change a game in our favor.

You mean like Simão that never did? Nahh he is a Scolari dear, even if Quaresma and Nani score an hatrick in the next game Simão will be back to the first eleven.

Protheus:

"haters! haters! haters!.." takes a breath "...haters! haters! haters!"

Get a new line as that one is slightly warn out buddy.

I'm not gay so I really don't give half a f@ck about either Baia or Ricardo. But any objection you may have against Ricardo, the same can be said about Baia. There are plenty of people that haven't forgotten the joke he was at Barcelona and if the Poborski goal was the only 'Poborski' goal he let in during his career things wouldn't have been so bad. The man let in plenty of shitty goals just like many other keepers. Yes, he was better than Ricardo in controling the box, he wasn't any better at shot stoping and he didn't have Ricardo's ability on the ball.

Take off your blue shades for a fucking second as it's getting quite tedious listening to your redundant theories. They're far from coresponding with reality, considering Ricardo was geered by Sporting's fans and constantly under pressure, presenting only your personal views as fact.

Baia won the CL, yes. The fucking Greek team was European champion as well, I guess that makes Charisteas and company fucking amazing. Red Star and Nottenham Forest have won as well.. world class for sure.

Baia is far more arrogant than Ricardo, actually he's a fucking c**t, and the fact that I liked him as a child doesn't cloud my judgement about that.

I don't give a f@ck who's in goal between Ricardo or Quim, but let's not try to make Baia out to be some super keeper; the man was constantly critisized during international tournaments for being shaky.

You hate Ricardo, that's fine. But don't assume anyone that doesn't want to lick Baia's ass simply hates him because he played for Porto. It's extremely fatiging.

Such anger, and yes haters. I don´t find another word for it. What do you want me to call them? The ones that hate baía guts and promote Ricardo without a good reason other than chose another keeper? It is a little too long don´t you think?

And no, Ricardo was not even close to Baía class. If you still think Ricardo is that good fine, think what you want. i am not trying to make you change that opinion because it is obvious you will stand by it no matter what and hey, everyone has the right to their opinion.

Baía arrogant? Have you talked with him any time before? Do you know his roots? What he does in life? I have met him and he is far from being arrogant. Next you will say Ricardo is an angel and never ever he acted like a arrogant either in interviews or when someone criticize something about him.

He had a bad spell at barça. Well if say bad spell is winning the Uefa cup, the league and the cup, yeah it was really "horrible". Did you kew he played half a season injured because he was asked to (that was his worst period there and he lost his place because of that - great reward huh?)

Then again like you say i have always my blue shades and you never ever lose you temper when someone say something bad about a sporting player and you are always fair and never ever biased toward certain players... yeah right.

Do i hate Ricardo?, nope i do not hate any player. Do I dislike Ricardo?, sure i do but i am talking about a performance matter, he is not good enough but for you everything envolving some players is like a personal insult or something.

Whatever, this is not worth it.

Oooh!!

Protheus wrote:Such anger, and yes haters. I don´t find another word for it. What do you want me to call them? The ones that hate baía guts and promote Ricardo without a good reason other than chose another keeper? It is a little too long don´t you think?

And no, Ricardo was not even close to Baía class. If you still think Ricardo is that good fine, think what you want. i am not trying to make you change that opinion because it is obvious you will stand by it no matter what and hey, everyone has the right to their opinion.

Baía arrogant? Have you talked with him any time before? Do you know his roots? What he does in life? I have met him and he is far from being arrogant. Next you will say Ricardo is an angel and never ever he acted like a arrogant either in interviews or when someone criticize something about him.

He had a bad spell at barça. Well if say bad spell is winning the Uefa cup, the league and the cup, yeah it was really "horrible". Did you kew he played half a season injured because he was asked to (that was his worst period there and he lost his place because of that - great reward huh?)

Then again like you say i have always my blue shades and you never ever lose you temper when someone say something bad about a sporting player and you are always fair and never ever biased toward certain players... yeah right.

Do i hate Ricardo?, nope i do not hate any player. Do I dislike Ricardo?, sure i do but i am talking about a performance matter, he is not good enough but for you everything envolving some players is like a personal insult or something.

Whatever, this is not worth it.

Pro,

You were lucky enough to not have had Ricardo at your club. I say lucky as you obviously wouldn't have been happy to see him playing for your club.

I can't say the same. Ricardo did play for Sporting and they were perhaps the worst years he has had to date. He didn't bring anything new to the club , other than high wages, and played quite poorly at times to the point of not playing at all. He's now gone and I really don't want to see him come back. He never seemed secure in goal for us and cost us millions, literally millions, with his lack of concentration at times.

Do I sound like someone that doesn't see the guy's short-comings?
Personally, I don't think so, but you may believe otherwise. Ok.

Baia did win quite a lot as a player, much more than he ever dreamed possible I'm sure... but he was on the bench for some of those titles at Barca. No need to go into it, but he was...

Overall, yes the man had a great career, no question. He'll go down as a Portuguese legend in goal and rightly so for what he's achieved, but that doesn't make him untouchable as far as criticism goes. That's really my only point. Everyone seems to be jumping down Ricarod's throat all the time and it just seems unnecessary. The benfiquistas, who were only too happy to falsely announce they'd signed him from Boavista, can't stand him because he signed for Sporting instead and portistas because he 'took' Baia's spot... and it seems neither will ever let it go. It's not helping.

Baia has appeared arrogant and his comments and general atitude towards Ricardo only show his less favourable side. That's where my only dislike for the man has come; he's shown himself to lack character. As a keeper, I think he had definite qualities that were often underrated by the foreign press, but he was no world beater... far from being the 'best keeper in Europe' as he's claimed. The guy used to be an idol of mine and I followed his career with a lot of enthusiasm from Porto to Barca back to Porto. Still, I remember both his good and bad qualities as a player... and 'banana' goals were a Baia trademark.

Baia faced plenty of criticism as a player during his time and it seems people try to erase this fact. The revolt around Baia playing the WC2002 was quite audible and it wasn't coming from me I assure you. Only after he lifted Porto's European trophies was he shown in a diferent light.

The crusade against Ricardo just seems to serve no purpose other than to throw the fucker off his game... seems kinda counterproductive to me considering he's playing for OUR country. Not saying this is your case, but it's pretty clear some people would rather see Portugal fail just to point the finger at Ricardo... and Baia strikes me as the kind of guy that's already done this...