Fun Foto Filler Friday: Who Let the Cigano Out?!

Seems like the only person who doesn’t realize Quaresma’s potential is Scolari. Having him bench ride while Simmy Simmy Ya (ODB! RIP) struggles is (being polite here) silly. Backing up Greg on this one: hopefully he gets some serious playing time on Sunday to slice and dice the Swiss.
And that certain Azul colored team tied Romania today… needed Buffoon to save ‘em on the PK… just mentioning it… one step closer to heading home… ha ha ha.

Posted from  Canada

My guess is Nani and Cigano will run the flanks against the Swiss. And hopefully it’ll yield Quaresma the nod to start in the quarters.

Posted from  United States

Looking past the Swiss and assuming we face Germany in the quarters:

I wish Scolari had tinkered with the formation more in qualifying, because I think we could have played an effective 5-4-1 against such a team:

Bosingwa—Pepe—-Carvalho—-Meira—-Nani
Ronaldo——–Moutinho—–Deco——–Quaresma
——————-NunoGomes——————

Obviously not the time to try such a thing now, but with 3 centerbacks we could control the German attack while allowing Bosingwa and Nani to play offensively in supportive runs to the wingers.

Looks defensive in formation style, but actually quite attacking.

With Petit looking ragged, our lack of a clear defensive midfielder could hurt us in the later stages of this tournament

Posted from  United States

thoroughly enjoying this blog, great work. Unrelated random question though, not sure of any other forum to post it: anyone have thoughts on the best place to catch a match in Fall River, MA? i saw someone post on here that they were catching a game at Cafe Rio (I think). looking for a good place to chug some sagres with fellow portuguese fans. any thoughts much appreciated. forca portugal!

Posted from  United States

OK, Holland scares me now. shit.

I second Marcos…I would still like to see the next Spanish game to see how villa and torres hold up against a defense that doesn’t believe that farting on the ball qualifies as a defensive effort…however, the dutch defense still seem to be as penetrable as a Hooter’s waitress; so if they play against a team that can actually string together an attack, then there’s bound to be a high scoring game…the rest of the portuguese defense also must show up rather than just PeePee and RC Cola-valho if we hope to pose a real threat…so far, we have a definite chance of winning this shit.

And if it so happens that we play Germany after the group stages, hopefully the only man to rival the prowess of CRonaldo’s hairstylist, Bastian Schweinsteiger, will still be upset from his red card and play like ass.

Posted from  United States

Actually I think Schweinsteiger will be suspended for 2 games (although I don’t know why, I just remember reading that somewhere)

Which means that when we play them (if it is them) he won’t play at all

I was talking to a German dude today and he said it was one game…but then again, he was like 5 Sagres in and slurring his speech

Posted from  United States

Alabaster; although the Dutch have a weak defence they do have vd Sar while we’re stuck with Ricardo. Anyway I don’t think we should worry about the Dutch, unless we face them, lets worry about the Swiss and Germany first.

I really hope Scolari uses the Swiss game to practise set pieces (corners, freekicks) because we’re really poor in that and the Germans will not be forgiving.

Posted from  Netherlands

I agree - the only way we’ll need to worry about the Netherlands or Spain (or Italy/France) is if we make it to the Final. We’re a long way off.

Time to think about Germany, Croatia, and our friends the Czechs, who we might face again before the final.

Given that Sunday’s game is meaningless for Portugal, and given the depth and quality of the Portuguese bench, will Portugal rest all of their starting 10 (not counting Ricardo) and avoid the possibility of injury/cards?

I guess an argument can be made that the benefits of playing another competitive (if meaninglesS) match together as a unit will give the players more chance to improve their game (e.g. against set pieces). But there’s always the risk that something could go wrong, and it seems like there is little reason to take a chance and good reason to rest the starting team.

Posted from  United States

I have to agree with Matt’s point of view on having the regulars play for a little, even if Sunday’s game is meaningless. I don’t mean to be like the announcers on ESPN and try to make a comparison to an American sport, but if you look at the Giants this year playing the full 60 minutes in week 17 of a pretty meaningless game for them it ended up paying dividends for them as they kept playing well. BUT they are two different sports, and on top of that I’m sure the Giants weren’t sitting there worrying about a player getting a Red Card and not being able to play against the Bucs the next week.

But yea, I wouldn’t mind seeing a whole different team either. It would be exciting to see how the “B” team plays. I definitely love it when Tommy Smyth gets all excited when he sees Nani or Quaresma coming on in the 70th minute of a game and he’s simply astounded by the fact that we have such depth.

Also, random question. I didn’t pick up on it until someone mentioned it on here and also during the re-cast of Wednesday’s game, but what the hell happened during that free-kick in the second half where supposedly Simao was arguing with Deco & CRon about who would take it. Anyone got any info on that?

Posted from  United States

I was in Lisbon 4 years ago in Alvalade watching us kicking the living day lights out of Spain. Got to Rossio at about 10 am and it looked like this mothers had invaded us yet again. On the way to the stadium via subway , yours truly, the missus and our daughter where the only porkchops except for 2 english couples …….. traumatic 20 minute ride………

http://www.pbase.com/tgdusty/portugal

We not only beat them … you should have been in the turnstiles after the game… LOL…. like we say in Portuguse ( puserao o rabo entre as pernas e fugirao )….LOL The fact that we where also in Luz Stadium to see us beat the Limes was a grande BONUS.

I’d say bring the Spaniards to the final and we will make Sopa de Caracois with them.

FORCA>< FORCA< FORCA

Tony B

Posted from  Canada

portugal holehole

Posted from  Belgium

oi he is a cigano that im proud of and he plays better than beckam so shut up

Posted from  United Kingdom

oi the cigano is good and plays better than beckam and im proud of him suck on that

Posted from  United Kingdom