The story is a familiar one; Portugal, with Cristiano Ronaldo, fully tweezed, gelled, bronzed and with all petulant reactions prepared, rehearsed and ready to go, are underwhelming at a major tournament once again.
A draw with an unfavoured, plucky nation in the first match, you say? Why, we have Iceland chilled and waiting for you, Mr Ronaldo, and might I suggest following this rather bitter meal with a dessert of surly condescension and whingeing?
The “small country mentality” remarks Ronaldo made after Portugal’s 1-1 draw with Iceland were evidence of exactly how oblivious Ronaldo must be to the trembling hordes of haters he has already accrued, as he coasts through the final few years of his peak.
For the preening Real Madrid goal-plunderer – around whom Portugal has built various stumbling teams – to disparage another national team of defending with steel and snatching a point in their first European Championships, well, it’s astonishingly ungracious, even for him.
What, for Ronaldo, would constitute a “big country mentality” one is tempted to ask; does it involve, for the last decade or so, allowing a team to swirl so incoherently in the gravitational field of their overarching star, only for said team to meekly exit tournaments, and for said star to bawl embarrassingly about the standard of the team around him? Hmmm, no, Portugal’s is not exactly the most enviable metal approach.
So, after stating that Iceland “are not going to do anything in the competition”, Ronaldo and Portugal played out a vexed, spitting scoreless draw with Austria, and Ronaldo missed what would certainly have been the winning penalty. Portugal have to beat Hungary in the final group match to qualify for the next round. They probably will beat Hungary, but then again they probably should have beaten Iceland and Austria, and the potent ability for this team, with Ronaldo entrenched in what must be an all-time deep strop, to angrily twitch themselves into paralysis is plain to see.
Meanwhile, most of the rest of the continent – heck, the world – is, at the very least, feeling a pleasant twinge of satisfaction. Schadenfreude isn’t a particularly admirable thing to take pleasure in, but when Ronaldo is involved, you can be found guilty of it like you can be found guilty of kissing at a French railway station; no one is out there sliding pieces of card between lips and hunting for convictions.
The situation is made all the more acute for Ronaldo by Gareth Bale’s slightly fortunate demonstration of exactly how possible it is for one player to – at least offensively – carry a team almost into the knockout stages. Thanks to two piece of laughable goalkeeping – Joe Hart’s especially – Bale has scored two-thirds of Wales’ goals, from two of his three major tournament free kicks. If not for Daniel Sturridge’s silken, low-backlift snapshot, Wales would be in firm command of their group. For the record, Ronaldo has taken 36 free kicks in major tournaments, and scored from none of them.
Bale’s success has cast a shadow over many of the tournament’s pre-hyped strikers; just take a look at this graphic`. As Bale – so far and away the best player on his team – rallies his comrades, defends their ability in press conferences, roars in unison with them, the egos of Zlatan and Ronaldo grow into even more grotesque, lolling blobs. One hopes that Ronaldo’s missed penalty might deflate his, at least a little, but such hopes are so often in vain.
Ronaldo has missed penalties before, spot-kicks more important than this one. In the Champions League final, against Chelsea, for example, a failure John Terry’s stubby studs compensated for. He has, though, now missed four of his last five penalties for club and country, a curious stat for a player who is normally so ruthless.
The singular superstars of this era of football have all found it difficult to haul their national teams onto their backs and drag them to glory. Lionel Messi is still considered, by some, to have fizzed sullenly more often than not for Argentina. Luis Suarez is probably more infamous for biting people and punching goal-bound shots off the line than he is for leading from the front for Uruguay. Neymar’s Brazil has caused more tears of anguish than joy. And these players all have highly competent teams around them, something Robert Lewandowski and Bale don’t enjoy.
So, what next for Portugal? The immediate future likely holds a terse win over Hungary, followed by Ronaldo saying something to the effect of “Thank god for me, CR7, Lord of Madeira, Saviour of the Portuguese people, and well done Nani for winning the penalty.”
A Round of 16 exit looms, and then, further into the future, as the slight dwindling of Ronaldo’s all-around skills become more apparent with age – a stage in life one assumes Ronaldo will not embrace with much comfort – Portugal will finally be allowed to drift off in thought of the post-Ronaldo era.
He is a historically great player, one whose statistical achievements alone argue a compelling case for him to be included on the Mount Rushmore of football. His club teams have won everything there is to win, with nearly all of them geared specifically around maximising Ronaldo’s sole production.
He has set new standards for consistent scoring, and given the footballing world a new benchmark for self-improvement. He is still, at age 31, arguably the best player in the world. And none of this means we have to feel sorry for him.
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