Tiago Silva: “The swagger lasted a week, the reality check 90 minutes” | OneFootball

Tiago Silva did not forgive the excessive euphoria that surrounded Benfica during the week leading up to the clássico at the Dragão — and summed it all up in one devastating sentence: «Benfica stopped playing in the footnotes and started playing at the Dragão. The swagger lasted a week, but the reality check lasted 90 minutes.»

The CMTV pundit recalled the atmosphere that had built up in the days before the match: «It felt like Benfica were not going to play at the Dragão, they were merely going to go through a formality.» And he listed, with irony, the narrative that had been built: «It was Benfica, Europe’s elite, Benfica putting on a show, Benfica dazzling, Benfica with super Palhinha, super Prestiano. It was Porto that played nothing, Porto that could not shoot on target, Porto with boring football, Farioli supposedly unable to sleep, terribly worried about Benfica.»

Tiago Silva also recalled a moment he saw as particularly revealing of the «boastfulness» that had taken over the Benfica world: «When Benfica returned from Milan, they were given live coverage of the delegation, from the airport all the way to Seixal. I must admit I even thought it was the return of a European champion delegation.»

For the pundit, throughout the whole week «it seemed the only question was by how much Benfica were going to win». But the match was played — and the script was not the one they had written.

Tiago Silva praised FC Porto’s performance, stressing that the result was fully deserved: «Benfica were inferior to FC Porto. FC Porto deservedly won, fairly, 3-1, when they could even have won by more.» And he added that Benfica, unable to deal with that reality, «created a narrative because they did not know how to handle the fact that they had been inferior».

The conclusion was summed up in the contrast that defined the week: seven days of swagger against ninety minutes of truth.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇵🇹 here.