Reader Request Hour

Over on the last article I wrote about honesty in the transfer market, Luis said he’d like to hear my thoughts on the U20 situation. Well, Luis as one of five loyal readers to the Offside Portugal Blog, you shall have your request granted…

In all honesty, I’m rooting for them to lose right now. They need to rid themselves of coach Jose Couceiro immediately. Losing 2-1 to a ten man GAMBIA is ridiculous. His comments after the game regarding the fact that they had come there to qualify and had done so are laughable. If he has his team thinking that simply qualifying for the next round of a tournament is sufficient to be considered a success, he needs to be removed from the locker room immediately. This rampant stench of accepting mediocrity in the Portuguese youth is upsetting and disgusting.

What kind of confidence can this team have in the next round, qualifying out of third place and coming off a loss to the smallest country on mainland Africa? Surely they’ll be boosted by the double loss of Andre Marques and Bruno Gama for the remainder of the tournament to injury. Maybe they can draw confidence out of the fact that, unlike the U21 team, they actually made it past the group stages of their tournament this year.

The talent is here. The past is now over. Qualification is NO LONGER a goal. It can not be. They need to rid themselves of those in charge with low expectations and push these players to show their true talent and ability to create. Or else, Vatican City might be putting together a U20 team next year to give Portugal another hard fought challenge.

Category: World Cup

Tags: U20, World Cup

Subscribe   The Offside RSS Feeds

Print

Share