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Hungary 0 – 1 Portugal : Keeping the dream alive!

September 9th, 2009 | By: Miguel | 21 Comments »

Done. 3 Points. On to the next.

The best thing that can be said about this game is “we won” everything else was looked at in utter disbelief.

I must be completely oblivious to what exactly Hungary needed to keep alive any hope of qualifying for this worldcup because it looked like they couldn’t care less about the result and any outcome, except loosing to Portugal would be a major victory! And when we scored they changed there objective to “not loosing to Portugal by more then one goal”. The game was played on a pitch that looked like my backyard… laden with irregularities. Seemed hand picked for playing an adversary such as Portugal. Down by one goal from the 10th minute and we still had to call them out to our side of the pitch. All Hungary did was hog the midfield with all they had and wait… yep… wait… and wait some more… and when we got nearer play a very physical game bordering violent with the cunning blessing of the referee. What a dick.

Mind you Hungary is a tough opponent. Very tough. From today’s match it’s easy to assume what’s in store for the next game… park the bus in front of the goal and wreck Portugal’s nerve from the first minute hoping a venomous counter-attack gets the job done.

We played beautifully against Denmark and were down one goal at half-time. We got down and dirty, mistreated the ball against Hungary and were up one goal at half-time. Go figure.

I had a knot in my stomach the entire game always expecting Hungary to score a fluke goal out of shear bad-luck from one of our defenders with 2 or 3 lucky rebounds mixed in. Queiroz did the usual lets-defend-this-goal tactic which has failed so miserably before. I’m still in disbelief it actually worked out this time. Nobody managed to win the midfield with an unbelievable amount of missed passes. We simply couldn’t string 3 passes together. And what happened with Tiago today hogging the ball on so many occasions? Did he read my previous game’s post and decided he would be able to pull a couple of Deco moves out of his hat? He played it very simple against Denmark. Received the ball and quickly fed it to Deco or Meireles. I had commented on it negatively although I did mention it wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. Now I know it wasn’t a bad thing. He can take comfort from the fact Meireles and Deco partnered in this sordid affair.
After an entire first half of this I was dismayed to see Queiroz sub Deco with Simão. The game was screaming for Maniche! Screaming! But… Maniche wasn’t on the bench was he? Nope. Maniche was as dismayed as I was sitting uncomfortably in the stands! Ok then who did we have that could win us the midfield battle? Moutinho was on the bench. He doesn’t have the strongest build but Simão isn’t exactly built like Arnold Schwarzenegger either. Come to think of it the lads are very similar in appearance. Oh well sometimes playing ugly wins you games and this was clearly the case.

We ended the game seeing Hungary desperately shoving the ball into our box in futile attempts to score. The knot grew tighter and tighter. Luckily no fluke goal appeared. No unlucky rebounds. And I thought we lacked scoring skills. But is my calculator not adding up right because I had us needing to score more goals to level out the goal difference disadvantage we have in case we tie in second place with Sweden?! Queiroz must have IBM’s Deep Blue doing his math! That freaking computer did beat Kasparov so what do I know. Fuck it.

A quick note on this night’s pathetic refereeing. There. Said it.

I can already hear some of the more ferocious critics of Portugal say we played crap and don’t deserve to go to South Africa. What do they understand?! Not a damn thing. You have to look at the entire picture of these qualifiers to fully understand exactly what happened and the game today is paramount to this understanding. This overall picture leads to one simple conclusion: Every effing opponent in this group is scared shitless of Portugal! I haven’t seen one single opponent (I mean it! Not one!) that played us head-on to win, even when winning was mandatory (as was the case today). Not Hungary, not Sweden and certainly not group leaders Denmark. And does Sweden deserve it more then us? They won against Hungary with a lucky rebound goal in the last minute and repeated the dose against Malta (MALTA FFS!) with a lucky late own-goal by a Maltese defender! I hope luck has run out for them and when they face Denmark next month it could very well show. And speaking of Denmark… excellent draw! Thank you Albania! Next months Denmark-Sweden will be a thriller! Best of luck for Denmark!

Group standings with 2 games to go:
Denmark – 18
Sweden – 15
Portugal - 13
Hungary – 13
Albania – 7
Malta – 1

Next games:
Denmark – Sweden (Oct. 10)
Portugal - Hungary (Oct. 10)
Denmark – Hungary (Oct. 14)
Sweden – Albania (Oct. 14)
Portugal - Malta (Oct. 14)

I’m starting to plan my trip to Lisbon on the 10th. Like Juca (national coach in 1986) said before we faced Germany (qualifying for Mexico 86): “Let me dream!”

Tags: Hungary, Portugal, World Cup 2010

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Comments

By msudzi | September 9th, 2009 at 7:02 pm

Looks like Sweeden picked and Denmark picked up some point. Time is running real slow for you guys. Then again why not go to the world cup thats one team POr_tu_gal as it were , will never win any kind of tournament on less it is that great sport what do you call it Hocky Patinhas. That’s has funny as those stupid puppets that play during the half of that boring league. Those stupid puppets have been on for decades number 1 in the ratings I presumme. Vive Italia

Posted from United States

By Jack | September 9th, 2009 at 9:09 pm

Denmark do deserve it more than Portugal. Portugal just falls asleep (like against Denmark and Albania) thinking the job is done or don’t even wake up thinking good looking football will score a goal. Then when Portugal are desperate players start hogging the ball. This is why Portugal are in the place they are in now.

Posted from United States

By Extraneus | September 10th, 2009 at 1:24 am

Bunch of pretty crappy matches in this group last night, all in all…

Portugal elbows it’s way to a narrow victory, even though the goal score is paramount in case of a tie with Sweden.

Sweden stumbles aimlessly around the Maltese national arena and let’s a Maltese defender do the job of securing them the most marginal of victories.

Denmark loses their lead and immediately crumbles, letting the Albanians take over the match and sending us home with a draw and more uncertainty.

None of the teams are really WC-material, unless they start getting their act together!

Posted from Denmark

By csabber | September 10th, 2009 at 5:19 am

Goal score isnt gonna to be a problem at the end, if everything goes according to “THE PLAN”. If we beat Hungary by 1 single goal our goal difference will be 6 (as sweden’s now), and if sweden draws with denmark or they will loose their goal diff. will be 6 or 5, but we scored more goals than they did. And finally, in the last round guess who would score more: Sweden against Albania, or Portugal against Malta

By Tutti | September 10th, 2009 at 7:42 am

I agree that the games have been chocking, however Italy has won a world cup on draws until they got to the quarter-finals and Denmark, who were called up on a last minute substitute to Jugoslavia, went on to win the European Championship. Msudzi,you obviously don’t understand much about soccer, or football, as u probably call it – you’re obviously the source of the “swine flu”

By Lala | September 10th, 2009 at 8:44 am

And you understand it how tutti? Football as you probably call it? Wow I’m guessing your USA born so probably know less

By Toodles | September 10th, 2009 at 12:04 pm

*sigh* I wish I had enough free time to go around and troll on the net.

Seriously.

Anywhoo onto the game… I am never expecting Portugal to play well under Queiroz. Won’t happen. The man is a moron.

And how annying must it be for the likes of Maniche who literally just travelled to Denmark then to Hungary…now back to Gerymany, for NOTHING.

Queiroz played the exact same team (Simao for Levezinho, but latter came on anyways), when he obviously could’ve introduced Moutinho and not play Tiago. Or Meileres. I know we’ll qualify, but it’ll be like once key players get injured or red carded during the tounrament itself or the play offs the new players introduced to the game will be so out of synch it will prove to be our downfall. So once again, thanks Queiroz.

Posted from United Kingdom

By Miguel | September 10th, 2009 at 5:13 pm

I’m starting to agree Queiroz just isn’t the man for the job. Damn how I had hoped he would help everyone forget Big Phil!! I was a huge critic of the guy. We played some horrendous soccer qualifying for the Euro 2008. But now… *sigh*

Posted from Portugal

By Toodles | September 10th, 2009 at 5:18 pm

Me tpp, Miguel. Honestly. When he left United, Sir Alxes and several players were all like “oh we’ll miss him” “he did tons here, at United”…United then go on to win the Premier League, Carling Up, reach the Final of the Champions League and Semi of the FA Cup.

Posted from United Kingdom

By Miguel | September 10th, 2009 at 6:07 pm

Also Cristiano Ronaldo not having scored a single goal in these qualifiers is highly unexpected. God knows how many of our attacks ended after he shot straight at the goalkeeper. Queiroz has midfielders play defenders (Duda). Defenders play in midfield (Pepe). Wingers play strikers (Ronaldo). What a mess.

One of our best plays was around the 85th minute when Meireles acted as winger and did one of the few well executed/timed crosses into the box where Nani (a winger) appeared to shoot just wide with only the goal in front of him. Is it me or should it be Nani and Ronaldo doing the crossing and a striker doing the shooting? Oh wait… at that time Queiroz didn’t have any striker on the pitch… “But Ronaldo is a striker!” I hear you say. If he was he would have scored at least one goal in the 6 matches so far now wouldn’t he? No. He is a winger. Could somebody let Queiroz know. Please. Thank you.

Posted from Portugal

By Paulinho | September 10th, 2009 at 9:28 pm

I will let him know Miguel lol.
I am new to this site, but I have been thinking Nani and Ronaldo on the wings for ages now! I also think Moutinho should play, he has alot of drive which would be good right now for a struggling team. I would like to see him play along side Maniche.

By Toodles | September 11th, 2009 at 10:49 am

We should have Derren Brown as our manager.

Posted from United Kingdom

By Miguel | September 11th, 2009 at 1:13 pm

Predicting the lottery numbers might come in handy to make the Portuguese Soccer Federation some money in case we don’t qualify!
I was thinking Megan Fox. She’d promise all sorts of nasty sex with the lads if they bring home the world cup. They’d f***ing eat the grass and any adversary standing on it!!!!

Posted from Portugal

By Toodles | September 11th, 2009 at 5:09 pm

Hahaha, I bet you if Megan Fox were manager, Ronaldo would score a hatrick every Portugal game!

& Derren Brown is going to play a footy game against Manchester United and all the players will not be able to move; he could do that against Hungary and Malta. Either way I still think Portugal would miss 40 times before scoring a goal.

Posted from United Kingdom

By Toodles | September 11th, 2009 at 6:30 pm

Random trivia about when Portugal qualified for Mexico ‘86.

Sweden finished third.

Malta finished last.

Posted from United Kingdom

By fernando | September 12th, 2009 at 5:42 am

Go Nuno Gomez he deserves to play in another World cup for Portugal!!!! Go Portugal……..it won’t be the same without u

Posted from Australia

By Miguel | September 12th, 2009 at 6:11 pm

@Paulinho:
It’s not that I wouldn’t like to see Moutinho next to Maniche. Both great players, but I don’t think Queiroz has ever played them together and now is not the time to “try them out”. Let’s qualify for the WC and then I think it’s even urgent he gets Moutinho in there. He’s a young talent and 30+ years old Deco and Maniche won’t make it to the Euro 2012.
@Toodles:
History has a funny way of repeating itself…
@fernando:
Seeing it is probably his last shot at a world-cup I would very much like to see him work his magic in the next 2 games. But he needs to play more a club level. And his spot is well covered at Benfica.

Posted from Portugal

By Paulinho | September 14th, 2009 at 9:13 pm

True enough Miguel. Its just a shame Moutinho went from a starter in Euro 08 and playing well in my opinion, to a bench warmer. I’d also like to see Danny take over for Deco in that midfield area. What a shame it is that he is injured.

By Toodles | September 30th, 2009 at 6:22 pm

Seeding system announced for play-offs
FIFA president Joseph Blatter has announced that teams will be seeded in the draw for the play-offs in the European World Cup qualifying section.

Portugal are unlikely to be among the top four seeds, meaning they are guaranteed a tough opponent, should they reach the play-offs, as their final obstacle to reach the 2010 World Cup.

Blatter explained that the position in the FIFA rankings table of the eight countries that make the play-offs will determine their seeding.

If the current second-placed teams hold onto their play-off spot, and Portugal manage to overhaul Sweden in Group One, the Seleccao (currently ranked 17th in the world) will have four teams ranked higher than them.

They will therefore be drawn against one of the following nations: Russia (ranked 6th), Croatia (9th), France (10th) or Greece (12th).

Posted from United Kingdom

By João | October 1st, 2009 at 4:43 am

Thanks for the heads up Toodles, there is also slight chance that we’ll be seeing Germany instead of Russia in the play off.

By Toodles | October 1st, 2009 at 11:10 am

No problem João.

Might aswell name the 22 man squad for the upcoming games.

Goalkeepers: Beto (FC Porto), Eduardo (Braga), Rui Patricio (Sporting)

Defenders: Bosingwa (Chelsea), Bruno Alves (FC Porto), Paulo Ferreira (Chelsea), Cesar Peixoto (Benfica), Pepe (Real Madrid), Ricardo Carvalho (Chelsea), Rolando (FC Porto)

Midfielders: Deco (Chelsea), Duda (Malaga), Joao Moutinho (Sporting), Nuno Assis (Vitoria Guimaraes), Miguel Veloso (Sporting), Raul Meireles (FC Porto), Tiago (Juventus)

Forwards: Cristiano Ronaldo (Real Madrid), Liedson (Sporting), Nani (Manchester Utd), Nuno Gomes (Benfica), Simao Sabrosa (Atletico Madrid)

Paulo Ferreira!? Cesart Peixoto!?

Queiroz has lost it, fellahs.

Posted from United Kingdom

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