It's not unusual for protagonists with one eye on their next game to see the one they have just lost from a very particular perspective but for Portugal manager Paulo Bento to claim that this one was generally even seemed to pushing it, even for someone suddenly under a bit of pressure.
When he kicked off with the admission that: “I believe it was a game that ended in the first 45,” it seemed he was going to provide a more detached assessment and it was disappointing then to have him claim initially that there had been nothing much but the referee’s mistakes between the two sides before the break.
Well, that and three goals: a fact that eventually obliged him to acknowledge that his own side had made mistakes, managed to pose little by way of an attacking threat and found themselves facing a team very capable of posing a big one. Now we were getting to the heart of things.
All-time record
And then there was the small matter of Thomas Müller.
Miroslav Klose
is one goal away from equalling (the Brazilian) Ronaldo’s all- time record of 15 goals at World Cups and must have been itching to be sprung from the bench here for he will not get many better chances of eclipsing his old rival
At this rate, though, Müller could be creeping up on both of them by the middle of July. He came here with five under his belt from South Africa and has, as he put it himself yesterday, “picked up where he left off.”
“Thomas is a very unorthodox player in his way of playing,” said Joachim Löw when asked about the young Bayern Munich star whose abilities around the box make more specialist strikers seem rather superfluous.
“As a coach sometimes you can’t predict his pathways on the pitch and that can be difficult for an opponent. He has only one aim and that is ‘how can I score a goal’ and he scores from situations where you don’t expect it.”
Müller himself still cautioned against getting carried away but along the way he damned Portugal with faint praise, observing that they had shown themselves to be "absolutely capable opponents". Stick that in your pipe Mr Ronaldo!
