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Originally Posted by VANFLAMESFAN
Doing it without their best player and their starting right back will help their confidence and going into a hostile enviroment like Bosnia should not be overlooked either.
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Fair enough, but, they didnt do all that hot awesome with their best player and starting right back. Regardless of the playoff games, the Portuguese qualifying effort was within the slimmest of hairs of being an unmitigated disaster.
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Originally Posted by VANFLAMESFAN
I do agree that if they play the way they've been playing in the qualifying, they stand no chance of getting out of the first round unless they get a really fortunate draw, but that's unlikely pending the seeds of course.
My expectations going into South Africa will be low, no doubt about it, but they were really low going into 2004.
At the end of the day, they didn't embarass themselves by not getting in and all this will be forgotten if they can put some kind of a run together. I'm not counting on it, but the World Cup will be a lot more interesting with a team like Portugal in.
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Of course this will all be forgotten, unless they fail to proceed past the group stage, then heads will roll. Everyone should remember that Brazil had to win a playoff game to qualify for the 02 WC, and I think they did okay once they got there.
Make no mistake though, the fashion in which this whole thing is remembered hinges upon the ensuing results. Do well and all is forgiven, and heroes they shall remain. Fail utterly and they may as well move to Bosnia.
In my mind though, they did embarrass themselves, they went into this as group favourites and narrowly edged into the playoffs by the skin of their teeth against a fairly weak group. Thats pretty embarrassing, not as embarrassing as Russia missing the dance entirely, but embarrassing enough...