Fernando Santos sacked after World Cup exit: End of an era for Portugal after Morocco loss – The Warm-Up

FRIDAY’S BIG STORIES

Ta-ra Fernando

The winds of change are blowing through international football. Eras are ending. And they didn’t come much bigger than the reign of Fernando Santos as Portugal coach, who stepped down yesterday. He first took charge in September 2014, more than eight years ago. That’s several lifetimes in football management terms; even without the trophies, simply lasting that long would be an achievement.

But there were trophies! Portugal’s first ever major tournament victory, at the 2016 Euros, and also the 2019 Nations League, which is a prize waiting for some context. Who knows, in a century’s time that may seem the greater achievement. For a start they actually won more games in the process.

There has been enough triumph in the broad sweep of his time in charge to outweigh the messiness of the ending. And probably enough to outweigh the fact that for a lot of his time in charge, Portugal’s football has been actively difficult to watch. But nevertheless, the end of one era is the beginning of another, and he leaves Portugal having done them two immediate short-term favours.

The first is the dropping of Ronaldo. We’re not saying that there isn’t some place for Ronaldo in international football, but his place as an automatic starter – and presumably as captain – has already been called into question. Successfully, too. And as such, the new coach won’t have to immediately begin their time in charge by picking the biggest fight possible; the first blows have already been exchanged. Which is, we imagine, something of a relief.

The second, which is connected is a question of style. In the victory over Switzerland, Portugal didn’t just look good: they looked positively vivacious. That’s sort of true about their defeat to Morocco, too, albeit they all collectively forgot how to finish. But there has to be some combination of all these spritely attacking players that is both sharp-edged and easy on the eyes. Fernando Santos leaves behind him a big arrow, pointing towards a brighter future.

Or they could just appoint José Mourinho. That’s what they’re going to do, isn’t it? And he’s going to pick every fight he can and play full miseryball and we’re all just going to have to put up with it.

Important Person Says Important Thing

The wheels of justice move slowly. What we got yesterday wasn’t a final decision; rather, it was a set of observations from the advocate general of the European Court of Justice. We won’t get the actual verdict until next spring. But this stands as an important indicator about how that might go, and in summary, if you’ll forgive the technical legal language, it goes something like:

The European Super League is bad.

A little bit of Latin for you there. More specifically, advocate general Athanasios Rantos has said that UEFA and FIFA are within their rights to impose sanctions on any club that tries to create an alternative competition, and doing so does not violate EU law.

“The FIFA-UEFA rules under which any new competition is subject to prior approval are compatible with EU competition law … Whilst ESLC is free to set up its own independent football competition outside the UEFA and FIFA ecosystem, it cannot however, in parallel with the creation of such a competition, continue to participate in the football competitions organised by FIFA and UEFA without the prior authorisation of those federations.”

So if they want to break away, they’ll have to break away properly. No Super League but also Champions League; no Super League but also Premier League. In or out. And while it’s quite funny to imagine Juventus, Real Madrid and Barcelona – to pick three teams entirely at random – playing out an endless triangular tournament forever, it’s probably not going to fly.

As noted, this is not a binding decision so much as an important legal opinion.

Getting Carried Away

There are many ways to build a successful football club. A great tradition of attacking football. A conveyor belt of young talent up from the academy. Having giant piles of money, that helps. But there is a pleasing simplicity about Real Madrid’s current approach, a plan so cunning that it could have come from the mind of a child. Brazil has lots of good footballers. Let’s go and get some of those.

Congratulations to Endrick, then: sixteen years old and already a Meringue. Obviously he can’t actually move to Madrid until he’s 18, but it’s all signed and sealed. Chelsea and PSG have been defeated. And once he gets there, he’ll join Éder Militão (24), Vinícius Júnior (22) and Rodrygo (21). Another coup for super-scout Juni Calafat, apparently.

Following football in the modern world is about learning to live with a number of contradictions. For instance, the industrial trawling of Brazilian football by Real Madrid and others means that players barely get a chance to feature for the clubs that uncover them. The league produces but rarely gets to enjoy. Of course, Palmeiras will be delighted with the money.

And yet it didn’t take long – two minutes and nine seconds, to be precise – for the less reflective part of our brain to get thoroughly carried away. Look at him! Just look at him! He’s brilliant. Get him into a friendly time zone as soon as possible and let us look at him every week.

IN OTHER NEWS

A philosophical question. You are a footballer, and you are going to score a goal. In normal circumstances, all being well, it seems fair to assume that you’d like to score the most spectacular goal possible. But if you’re already 4-0 down to the best team in the world, and so this goal is going to be nothing more than a consolation, does that still hold true?

Jéssica Silva there, firing a rocket past Barcelona. Score that at 0-0 and it’s full delirium: shouting, fist-pumping, maybe even a small bundle over by the corner flag. But at nil-four, it gets a quick hug and a thumbs-up. A pity, really. Perhaps we should make it okay for players to celebrate unimportant-but-brilliant goals in the manner they deserve. You only get so many chances to pull off a kneeslide in your life. A shame to let one drift past.

RETRO CORNER

On this day in 1961, Jimmy Greaves made his debut for Tottenham. He’d come back to England after an unhappy spell at AC Milan, and in the end had moved for the precise sum of £99,999 – Spurs manager Bill Nicholson was worried that becoming the first £100,000 player would put undue pressure on his new star striker.

Not that Greaves ever seemed to feel pressure, at least not on the field. He scored on his full debuts for Chelsea and AC Milan, he scored a hat trick here, and he scored again on his West Ham debut some nine years later. Apparently the first goal here is a “flying scissor kick”, though the camera only captures the aftermath. Goals one, two and three of his eventual 266, a record that Harry Kane should break some time in January.

HAT TIP

“When the meeting [between his sons and Villarreal] finished they called: ‘Bloody hell, Javier, what sons you have!’ They know every player, every team, every detail. I heard Raphinha say he prefers to watch series; my boys watch every match from morning to night, drinking mate. When they were little, I’d say: ‘You follow the No 2 and the No 4; you follow the 8 and the 5; you, the 10 and 11. I’ll do the others.’ They would note it all down: good passes, bad passes, headers won, headers lost …”

Mac Allister’s place in Argentina’s side is a triumph, then, for every football nerd that ever got lost in the game’s endless realities. And also a triumph for the footballing community. “At games, people pat me on the back: ‘che, Colo, how did you do it?’ No, no, no, no. His mum did is fundamental; we have to value more the mothers’ work. I’m not the ‘father’ of their formation: it’s the clubs, the coaches, the kids they played with, the whole family, and Alexis’s older brothers were so important for him. They’re not footballers because they were told to be: they’re footballers because they like it, it’s their passion.”

COMING UP

More action in the women’s Champions League, including PSG vs. Real Madrid. Birmingham take on Reading in the Championship. And it’s Liverpool against AC Milan in the Dubai Super Cup, whatever that is.

Have a lovely day, and we’ll be back tomorrow.