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| Friday, 03 December 2010 22:33 |
Benfica move to within 5 points of FC PortoBenfica 2-0 Olhanense Benfica have placed a little bit of pressure on Liga leaders FC Porto as the Lisbon side doubled-up on Algarve outfit Olhanense. A goal either side of the interval by Oscar Cardozo and Javier Saviola secured the win for the Eagles, who will now have to wait until Monday to see if their victory has made inroads into Porto’s lead.
It was a case of mission accomplished for Benfica in an entertaining game to kick off Round 13 of the Liga ZON Sagres. However, it was far from straightforward, especially in the first half as Olhanense gave a good account of themselves at the Estadio da Luz.
Driven forward by the excellent Paulo Sergio, the visitors caused the home defence plenty of problems in the opening half, with Roberto having to save well from Jorge Goncalves to prevent the Algarve outfit from taking the lead.
At the other end of the pitch Olhanense goalkeeper Moretto was returning to his former club, where he had an unhappy spell blighted by several clangers. It must be something to do with the venue, because the Brazilian stopper, who has been in impressive form this season, gifted Benfica the lead with a crass mistake in the 42nd minute.
Moretto blunder
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Normally Olhanense would take some 1500 fans to the Stadium of Light but when Benfica announced they would be charging 17.50euros admission for seats the majority of supporters decided to stay at home and watch the game on TV. To encourage fans to travel, particularly when games are live on TV, clubs will charge 5 to 10 euros but on this occasion Benfica shot themselves in the foot by being greedy. The hundred fans who did make the trip included forty-six expats & Portuguese fans who were not best pleased when kept in their coach for over an hour when they arrived at the stadium. Twenty riot police were on hand to shepherd the group of grandparents, mums & dads & children to their seats. Not the way to welcome a friendly contingent of fans to one of Europe’s top stadiums. No wander there were only 25,000 in the crowd if this is the way they treat their customers.
Forca Braga,
ruma os Tunneis!
He has been one of our mos consistent players and where would we be (or have been last year) without all of his goals.
Cardozo has proven to be one of the "don't touch" players on this team.
Give respect where it is due.
You need different types to be successful and GoalDozer is one of the best at this type, combine him with a fleet footed finesse type ala Saviola or even better if they had gotten Falcao and then the production goes through the roof.
I remember GoalDozer and Nuno Gomes (who was selfless) being an awesome combo before Kinky Flowers was hired and decided Nuno Gomes was retired, as well as benching Goal-Dozer. He then started So-Zero who was fast and shifty..and got a total of 4 goals in the majority of the season. Clearly he didn't like GoalDozer's style either.
As history serves.. So-Zero got hurt and GoalDozer came on to score 17 goals in only a partial season.
You might not like this type of striker, and he misses many chances I will grant that, but the fact of his production rate as well as as his ability to get open in prime real estate should be respected.
If DiMaria had been even an average crosser GoalDozer would've doubled his account last year, most of his goals cam from Coentrao & Saviola.
Trust me when I say if we lose GoalDozer in the off-season it will hurt us more than DiMaria & Ramires. Besides Coentrao he is our Most Valuable Player.
anyways im still not much of a cardozo fan.. you rarely see the guy sprint and its a fact.. the only time i remember him really running after a ball, is when he got tackled hard and injured until now.. unfortunately hes our only good striker at the moment..
best tactic is to get rid of JJ, bring in domingos paciencia, so we can have an amazing coach to work attack minded and no dumb last minute changes (ex. liverpool game and porto)...