An embarassing defeat at home was unthinkable. After this defeat Portugal was in 4th place of Group 1 of the 2010 World Cup qualifiers. These 3 players said they can't afford to concede goals in the last minutes at home. I agree with them.
00:00- Simao Sabrosa-
"Having the lead, winning 1-0 then getting a draw. Later, a 2-1 with a few minutes to go. We wanted to score goals and we couldn't. We ended up conceding a goal to bring the game to a draw, then another and lost the game. I think that once we are winning 2-1 at home, we can't afford to concede goals in the last 4 minutes. That's football. We're confident. Without a doubt this result is an obstacle. We have to stay together and think of achieving our objective which is to be in the world cup."
00:36 Nani - "We were disorganized for a little bit in the last minutes, and they took advantage of that very well."
00:42 Deco- "When we're winning, we can't keep attacking when there are 5 minutes to go."
00:55 Hugo Almeida- "They're things that happen in football. Unfortunately we lost. We had the game in our hands. We were superior basically during the whole game. In 2 or 3 times we weren't paying attention, we conceded goals. It can't happen anymore and we are very sad. We need to look ahead."
01:40 Simao Sabrosa- "I think the result is unfair. We had a few goal opportunities and could have scored more. It will be an example so it doesn't happen again."
My favorite part of the interview-Simao is on the defensive. The journalist brings up a good point. Portugal can't score a lot of goals in every game. Case in point: the 2 games after this defeat, Portugal scored 0 against Sweden and Albania.
Journalist: "Do you think it's because the national team lacks strikers?"
Simao- "Strikers, what do you mean by 'lacks strikers'?"
Journalist: "Lots of players who fail to score goals."
Simao- "We have 3 games in the era of Carlos Queiroz, we have 11 goals, do you think it's not much?"
Journalist:"But we failed to score some."
Simao- "I think it's important to score. It's also important not to concede goals. Today we scored but we didn't need to concede the goals so it's everyone's fault."
What do you think of their statements?