Portugal head the list of potential World Cup disappointments

Those seeking comfort following last night’s less than convincing England performance need only look at Portugal’s result in Covilha. Held to a 0-0 draw by Cape Verde, Carlos Queiroz’s men go to the tournament in stone cold form and are heading into a tough group in which they will be competing against Brazil, the Ivory Coast and North Korea for qualification. At this rate, the Koreans will fancy their chances.

Of course, it is dangerous to read too much into the results from pre-tournament friendlies but Portuguese fans will have every right to feel even more worried should their team not perform appreciably better in their two remaining warm up games against Mozambique and Cameroon. Even if they do improve, it’s fair to say that an advance on their fourth place finish in the 2006 tournament is currently a long way off.

For long periods during the qualification campaign, it looked as though Portugal may not make the finals at all. They endured an horrific start in which they won only one of their opening five games. Their improvement in the second half of the qualifying schedule and the routine manner in which they beat Bosnia Herzegovina in the play-offs highlighted the team’s potential, although the fear is that it may prove to be a false dawn.

Following last night’s stalemate against the team FIFA rank 117^th in the world, Queiroz was reeling off the sound bites you would expect from a man who knows time is running out to get his team into shape. “This was a training match. We’ve only been together a few days and you can’t expect too much,” he said. “But we showed the tactical discipline and awareness which I wanted to see.”

Unsurprisingly, much of the focus and expectation is on Cristiano Ronaldo’s influence on the side. Ominously however, the Portuguese captain has rarely produced his club form for the national side and has sought to lessen his burden by warning that he can’t be expected to perform miracles in the tournament. Sadly however, if his side are to make any kind of impact in the tournament, they would appear to need them.

Of course there will be plenty of other teams at the tournament who have the potential to disappoint to the extent Portugal look capable of doing. France and Germany are two other established teams who are enduring difficult pre-tournament build-ups and appear to have lost faith in their coaches, whilst Diego Maradona’s erratic management style and squad selection mean it’s anybody’s guess how well Argentina do.

For now however, the spotlight is on Queiroz’s side following last night’s result. “We’re still at the beginning, we’re still getting ready”, Ronaldo said after the game. “We’re not going to take this draw too badly. By the time we get to South Africa we’ll be better than this”. With their crucial opening game against the Ivory Coast just three weeks away, fans of Selecção das Quinas will be hoping that their captain is as good as his word.