Portugal are European Champions

Revan

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Congrats Arruda. Not the best champion ever, but they left everything on the pitch and deserved the win.
 

Phil

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Tonight we will have the biggest party this country ever saw, millions upon millions in the streets in every cities and villages
Ahh I wish I was there. I can imagine all the sleepy towns all throughout the Alentejo waking up for this.
 

baanke laal

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Must be surreal for the Portuguese football fans. I am sure they did not expect to win it at the start of the tournament with this team.

Eder scoring a winner of that quality is the stuff of dreams :eek:
 

Striker10

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I think this is the poorest Portuguese team in my living memory. That said, every player gave 100% and for that reason, they represented their country well. Congrats
 

Treble

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I reckon Portugal will have a stronger team in Russia and may go there with the best midfield. A.Gomes, R.Sanches, Carvalho and J. Mario may develop into top players over the next two years. Portugal may have a problem with their CBs though. They are already a bit oldish.
 

Globule

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Wanted France to win before the match because of the recent attacks and the fact they were hosts, but it's nice to see a different nation win.

Congratulations to Portugal.
 

Parma Dewol

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An incredible achievement for Portugal. I've always disliked their theatrics over the years, and it would be an understatement to say that Pepe is one of my least favourite players, yet credit where it's due. They showed an incredible resilience throughout the whole tournament and seemed to have the perfect game plan for every opponent. Always seemed to do exactly what needed to be done.

From a United fans' point of view, this was a brilliant moment:
 

Smashin

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I reckon Portugal will have a stronger team in Russia and may go there with the best midfield. A.Gomes, R.Sanches, Carvalho and J. Mario may develop into top players over the next two years. Portugal may have a problem with their CBs though. They are already a bit oldish.
As far as CB go Rúben Semedo and Paulo Oliveira will be the next ones, the first will be definitely ready, the former depends on how much playtime he gets at Sporting and how he develops.

I predict Pepe/J. Fonte + Rúben Semedo.
 

Benfiquista!

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I still cannot believe it! What an achievement! I criticized this team a lot, but they exceeded themselves! Thank you so much for this!

Champions of Europe!!! :D
 

Adzzz

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Delighted for Ronaldo and Nani, despite me having France in a draft!
 

Snow

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Congrats. Overall not undeserving as you were unbeaten and got stronger as you progressed. You really had this title coming.
 

Jazz

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Nice pics! Congratulations to all our Portuguese caftards!:)
 

GifLord

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Don't forget we had Danny, Bernardo Silva and Fábio Coentrão injured, for Russia 2018 we have a very talented crop of young players coming through the ranks.
I think you used up all of the luck in this tourney if u expect to do something similar
 

barros

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I reckon Portugal will have a stronger team in Russia and may go there with the best midfield. A.Gomes, R.Sanches, Carvalho and J. Mario may develop into top players over the next two years. Portugal may have a problem with their CBs though. They are already a bit oldish.
Adrien played really good and he was the man to stop the other teams middle field.
 

Raees

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To the country which gave us Bebe and arguably the best player we ever had, Nani and Ando and Mr Jose.. as well as Arruda (one of the good guys on here) congratulations!
 

Raees

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Portugal is right up there with Greece , the most undeserved and boring winner EVER!!
Disagree. Maybe undeserved based on this tournament but as a nation they truly deserve a major tournament victory. One of the most important football nations of all time and in modern football I struggle to think of a more influential nation outside the usual big countries.
 

MichaelKorleone

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All the top teams knocked each other out by the end of the tournament. Not as if one side beat everyone else only to lose in finals.

Portugal beat France (1-0) who knocked out Germany (2-0) who knocked out Italy (shootout) who knocked out Spain (2-0). France, Germany, Italy and Spain were probably the top 4 favorites (in any order) with the likes of Belgium, Portugal, etc as dark horses before the tournament. Portugal also stopped Wales as well as France from scoring in 210 minutes and those two sides were the top 2 scoring teams of the tournament. Portugal kept a clean sheet against Croatia too and conceded only one goal in knockouts (Lewandowski) over 450 minutes while scoring 5.

About the argument regarding qualifying 3rd in the group which would have seen them knocked out in previous tournaments, maybe they would have gone for the 4th goal in the Hungary match if they knew finishing 3rd would throw them out. For the last few minutes Portugal were aware they're 2nd in the group and could move to 3rd if Iceland win against Austria. Hence they probably wanted to stop Hungary winning and didn't mind drawing the match as they would have qualified with 2nd or 3rd place. We can't completely extrapolate the performance of a team under certain rules to a different set of rules hypothetically imo.

They were in the Group of Death only last edition along with Netherlands, Denmark and Germany but they reached the semis losing to Spain in penalty shootout who won their 3rd tournament on the trot. Portugal are possibly underwhelming compared to a lot of previous champions but specific to this edition, I can't begrudge their win seeing no one else blew opponents away. Portugal are not even blessed with a lot of attacking players to blame them for being defensive.

For me Griezmann was the best player overall with Pepe the best Portuguese player (despite missing Wales match), especially in knockouts. That's similar to how I felt during 2014 WC - Robben the best player overall with Mascherano the best Argie in knockouts (Argentina also conceded only one goal in knockouts albeit 1-0 in finals, while scoring 2).