The Ball – Remember when Joao Felix was whistled upon his arrival in Gaia… Will the fennelitis return? (to choose)

After insulting João Félix on the outskirts of Porto in 2019 and mocking João Mário in Alvalade last March, it was now Otávio’s turn to be the target of a loud whistle when, the day before yesterday, in Luz, with the Portugal shirt, he entered the final moments of the duel with Bosnia. Is the club sickness that has seemed in the past two decades out of context for the national team’s comeback?

If the answer to the question is yes or if it is no, we will know in the following chapters of home games. And although what follows will be at the Estádio Algarve, with Luxembourg, on September 11, challenges with Slovakia will follow, on October 13, in Dragão (was yesterday’s episode with Otávio forgotten?), and with Iceland, on November 19, in Alphalady.

What is certain is that the situation has been repeated from game to game and thus began to take on a certain regularity that does not bode well.

As we saw in the last two matches of the selection, with the whistles of Joao Mario, from Benfica, the moment he entered Portugal – Liechtenstein (4-0), on March 23, in Alvalade – the fact that he entered in the 1 minute from the end would be the reason for his resignation from the national team – and with Ottavio being the target of equal ridicule the day before yesterday in Luz.

João Félix also faced a difficult situation, albeit with a different profile: the former Benfica player was insulted by fans when he arrived by car – some of those present even knocked on the car’s windows – to the Selection concentration at a hotel in Vila Nova de Gaia, in November 2019.

Indeed, an important part of the national team’s success in recent years – European champions in 2016, Euro 2004 finalists, fourth place in the 2006 World Cup and promotion to the Euro 2012 semi-finals – depends on a true federation of the country. About the team – who doesn’t remember the flags in the windows? It certainly helped during this period that the vast majority of those called up played for clubs in foreign leagues…