Big Phil: Portugal are ‘halfway to paradise’

June 8: Luiz Felipe Scolari has called on Cristiano Ronaldo and his Portugal teammates to build on their impressive Euro 2008 opening win and seal their quarterfinal place against the Czech Republic on Wednesday with a game to spare.

Second half goals from Pepe and Raul Meireles earned the 2004 finalists a deserved 2-0 victory over Turkey to put them top of Group A on goal difference above the Czechs, 1-0 winners over co-hosts Switzerland.

In 2004 Portugal were playing catch-up after a shock opening loss to gatecrashers Greece but judged on this evidence that setback taught them an invaluable lesson.

Scolari explained: "I know how important the opening match is. When you start by losing the risks and pressure are higher. We’re going to try to keep up this rhythm. We’ll be confident (against the Czech Republic) but not too confident.

"We’ll watch videos of the Czechs — they play in a different way to Turkey, let’s see if we can keep it up and keep playing this beautiful football as that way we’ll go through to the second round.

"We are halfway on the road to qualifying. If we get six points we should qualify, so 50 per cent after one match is excellent. It gives us some breathing space."

Portugal’s showing was all the more noteworthy as they went into Saturday’s game at the Stade de Geneve rocked by the last minute withdrawal of number one goalkeeper Quim.

—AFP