The two biggest games of Santos’ career and his contract with the Portuguese national team

They were swollen. So many great generations, so many expectations, so many opportunities to combine talent with faith at least once. But so many failures. So many had set out to lead Portugal to a promised land. any country. At every tournament. To success. At a conquest.

By the summer of 2014, the general belief was that another cycle was complete. More precisely, the threat of closure. The position of Elector, the worst for the Nouvelle Vague (and not only) of the Portuguese coaches. It wasn’t attractive, the last thing he made sure was a good stamp in her job card. A job that nobody wanted, didn’t like, didn’t see anything useful in it, no prospects.

The feeling of Portuguese public opinion at the time was one that Fernando Santos never hid in his public speech. “Same Greek as Portuguese”. For his homeland patriots, Santos was more Greek than Portuguese in training. In fact, they most likely included him in their ranking, identified with ours. Not anymore.

It had nothing to do with appreciation. That has always been the case. From all Portuguese. Before he even decides to go abroad and come to us for the first time. And then to show up there as a student on the first day of school with his hands tied tightly to give the impression that he was making an effort to learn what race that was from his companions, who had pledged to introduce him officially, welcomed him at the time .

In one of his first biographies, one of the first, Jose Mourinho, who finds it difficult to find a good reason even for his blood, had praised him, admitting that the Porto Santos left him for the course at the top Starting Europa, and in its transformation into “Elite,” was a set that—generally—guy, any coach would do.

Since then it has been claimed in Portugal that the ideas, the method, the professionalism and the way it works were the foundation on which the Portuguese coaching school was built that has dominated the world in the 21st century. Not only in terms of patents or regular innovations and philosophies, but the emergence of top technicians has ensured the interplay in the whole way of working of the Portuguese football professionals and therefore in every aspect of the modern monarchy in relation to the logic of sport, football companies.

The date, the doves and the snakes

Bad lies, but in the fall of ’14 the Portuguese weren’t interested in any of that. They probably hadn’t even thought about it, let alone expected it, when the post of elector was taken over by the National – stemming from the essential persecution – that a penalty win away from eighth in the world last summer – Santos takes over to salvage the mess caused by his predecessor Paulo Bento. For most, it was seen as a solution that included the best, the worst “white” towel, a choice of finish and… we’ll see.

He made his debut on October 11, 2014. Against France, at the Stand de France. With defeat. One more. In the dressing room, he spoke to the players after the game. Taking advantage of the situation, place and time, he urged them to do whatever is on their mind to help the team return to the same stadium on July 10, 2016.

It turned out to be consistent. He did it by putting the very big “I” at the service of the team, he tamed footballers fit for … demonstration games, as always, in each of his jobs, worked for the result with which, what he has, always from the front the order of the team in the stadium. And as long as the method works, it convinces. Both his players and his compatriots who are used to others.

“My wife tells me I’m the most beautiful man in the world. Obviously I’m not, but in her eyes I am. It’s going to be like that if we win the cup. “Do you think there will be at least one Portuguese who celebrates less because we didn’t play good football,” he said, beaming before the start of Euro 2016 and the fact that he had taken back the tickets for the next final.

He got there panting even. With patience, focus, passion and work, which is what his quadruple stands for. Much luck. The result counts. It could also be the title of his own biography. He himself captured it masterfully the day after Portugal’s triumph and his coronation as European champions: “We were as simple as doves and as clever as snakes.”

Standing on the bench, pay rise

He didn’t need anything else. The… anti-tourist “Engineer of Penta” (nicknamed due to his academic studies), the deeply religious (one of the first things he did when pioneering in Greece was finding out there were Catholic churches), the Theriaklis, Constantly blackmailed, Fernando Santos was no longer synonymous with condescension, but became the messianic messenger of football for the Portuguese.

His signing in ’14 was for a contract until the Euro final of the triumph. That even the Portuguese themselves, when they took the job, according to polls, didn’t bet their team would reach the stadiums of France. Santos agreed €1.23 million and with a projected conquest bonus (and yet he stepped in…) of 250,000.

Immediately after his payment, the old claim was realized and the then 62-year-old Santos signed a new four-year contract with a term of the next euro, that of 2020. His earnings doubled and reached 2.5 million euros a year. without exception bonus accounts, either through a contract or through the – increased by the European coronation – sponsorships.

Confidence was not altered by failure at the 2018 World Cup (where he was the sixth highest voter), with Portugal only eliminated in the “16” by Uruguay. Just as it was renewed in 2019 with another title, the Nations League. Meanwhile, Santos has been consistently voted among the top (and often top) coaches in the world by various organizations and institutions.

The Covid outbreak has changed the dates. Everywhere, everywhere, everywhere. But not the universal recognition he unwaveringly enjoyed. Euro 2020, which was supposed to have its second round on the bench of Iberia, finally took place in 2021, but he already had his contract (which always satisfied the desire of the dressing rooms, the federation administration, the media and public opinion) from formerly extended by ’20, for another four years, to 2024.

The economic data of the new agreement are obviously adjusted to what the pandemic has imposed. As long as the Covid would limit the action, not the slightest increase in Santos’ earnings was envisaged. If and when normality (still new) returns, then they would now exceed 3 million euros, including the various bonuses (300,000 had achieved the reconquest of the euro, for example).

The second exclusion in a row of the “16” in the final of a major event, this time from Belgium at the last Euro, hurt. He provoked the first public objections and disputes, in which there was talk of a change of baton. They weren’t the majority, not even the noisy minority, but in cases like this it doesn’t take much to catch fire. Behind them are mainly the international Portuguese.

They were the ones who stepped forward and tried to hold it back when last fall the damage was done in qualifying for the upcoming World Cup when Portugal played for two results against Serbia in the group stage final to take first place and to qualify but eventually lose by goals in the delays.

They kept it, yes, but now it’s undoubtedly burning and it’s obvious that it can go out in a way. the difficult one That is, the verification of the ticket through the final process of the playoffs. There, Portugal is first expected in the semi-finals by Turkey (March 24, 9.45 p.m., OPEN TV, Cosmote Sport 1HD and LIVE on Sportish) and then consequently in the final Italy, which faces the clear underdog in the first leg, North Macedonia.

It doesn’t seem easy for the Iberians. It doesn’t sound easy. It is by no means easy. This repair, which the “engineer” has to do, is one of the most difficult that he has had to cope with in his more than thirty years of coaching career.

And it may not seem particularly fancy since it doesn’t hide anything silvered, a title or a conquest right now, at this point, but if he manages to master that too, then he’ll only have one left. The most demanding, but also the most tempting. The most important thing for his weighing up, his choices and decisions.

Heck, this is a World Cup…