When the Portuguese National Team was eliminated from the 2022 World Cup in Qatar at the hands of the Moroccan national team (1-0), Fernando Santos’ place as coach was also threatened. Sure enough, it didn’t take a month for Santos to be fired as Portugal coach, and then in January, the Portuguese football body appointed Roberto Martinez as the new coach.
Martinez’s appointment, on the one hand, is quite confusing because the former Everton coach did not have convincing achievements while coaching Belgium. In fact, Martinez failed to take advantage of the “Golden Generation” of the Belgian national team, which was strengthened by many star players who were performing brilliantly in Europe at that time, such as Kevin de Bruyne, Eden Hazard and Romelu Lukaku.
Moreover, Belgium was quite painfully eliminated at the 2022 World Cup, where Belgium failed to qualify for the group. This failure seemed to be the end of the golden generation of the Belgian national team and the exit for Martinez from the coaching chair.
On the other hand, the appointment is Portugal’s attempt to improve things. Santos, indeed, was instrumental in being able to present the 2016 European Cup trophy. However, when the coach started to fail to give his best, the option of dismissal was very difficult to avoid.
Martinez’s six-year coaching career as Belgium coach and leading Belgium to third place in the 2018 World Cup may be a foundation and new beginning for Portugal.
The experience of the 2022 World Cup is quite painful for Portugal. Being eliminated in the quarter-finals at the hands of Morocco tarnished the face of Portugal, which incidentally was filled with several star players.
Inevitably, Santos’ decision to dismiss was considered quite correct, and Portugal, which is full of quality players, needs someone who can build a solid team. Considering Portugal’s performance so far since being coached by Martinez, it seems that Martinez is the right person to replace Santos. Unmitigated, from 10 matches in qualifying for the 2024 European Cup, Portugal won 100 percent of the wins.
This perfect winning record was marked by the productivity and solidity of the team’s play. Portugal recorded 36 goals or an average of 3.6 goals per match and Portugal only conceded 2 goals.
This means that if you trace Portugal’s performance statistics so far, Martinez gives new hope for Portugal. This hope began to appear with Portugal’s smooth qualification to the 2024 European Cup which will take place in Germany.
Apart from that, Martinez seems to have built a solid squad. Cristinao Ronaldo is still the mainstay of Portugal’s game. The player who has a career in the Saudi Arabian League has so far been Portugal’s top scorer with 10 goals out of the 36 goals scored by Portugal during the 2024 European Cup qualifiers.
Martinez’s challenge is not easy. The first is to reduce the egos of the players or also eliminate dependence on certain players, such as Ronaldo. When introduced as Portugal’s coach, the Spanish coach admitted that Portugal was one of the best national teams with the best players in the world. In fact, he also acknowledged Ronaldo’s quality.
With this, Ronaldo will still be part of Martinez’s work system as Portugal coach. Evidently, Ronaldo is often played during the 2024 European Cup qualifiers. Therefore, it seems that Martinez will face quite a dilemma if he simply excludes Ronaldo’s role from the Portugal squad. In terms of productivity and ambition, Ronaldo’s role on the front lines is still large.
However, Martinez also needs to learn from past experiences, where his big role created dependency. For example, when Ronaldo was benched in the match against Morocco in the 2022 World Cup quarter-finals.
Because of that, Portugal’s game came to a standstill. However, when Ronaldo entered the field, Portugal’s game changed somewhat, but Ronaldo’s presence was considered too late and did not succeed in saving Portugal from defeat. As a result, Santos was criticized for not playing Ronaldo from the early minutes.
However, Martinez also needs to see that this dependency can paralyze and hinder regeneration in the Portugal squad. Therefore, young players got second place behind Ronaldo, who is already 38 years old.
Furthermore, Portugal’s real challenge is when they face solid and strong teams in Europe. If we examine the composition of the national team in Group J of the European Cup qualification, it would not be an exaggeration to say that Portugal deserves to qualify.
Group J for qualifying for the 2024 European Cup consists of Portugal, Slovakia, Luzembourg, Iceland and Bosnia-Herzegovina. Generally, Portugal’s rival teams are not very prominent in a European context and Portugal seems to be on its own as a strong team. Maybe the situation would be different if Portugal’s opponents were there. There are solid teams like England and France. With that, Martinez will face a serious challenge.
Portugal’s perfect achievement during the qualifying period for the 2024 European Cup cannot be the sole reference that Martinez has succeeded in building the Portugal squad. In fact, Portugal needs to be more alert to the bigger challenges in the 2024 European Cup.
ASL
