Ronaldo and Bale are teammates at Real Madrid, but will be enemies come kick off Wednesday night in Lyon.
More than 20,000 Welsh nationals will descend on Lyon Wednesday to watch their Welsh Dragons take on Cristiano Ronaldo and Portugal in what is, surely, the biggest game of their nations soccer history.
If only Gary Speed could be here to see what Coleman’s Dragons have achieved on one of the world’s biggest stages.
Many of the players playing under Chris Coleman in this tournament were Speed’s played back in 2011 when the Welsh manager and former Leeds United player was found hanged in his home. His death at just 42 years old sent shockwaves through the British soccer community, but those shockwaves were seismic for the Welsh.
Coleman lamented, clearly still hurt by his friend’s passing, “he could be sitting here where I am, enjoying what we’re enjoying” if he had not died so prematurely. Coleman and his Dragons would clearly see the game against Portugal as something that they could all dedicate to Speed.
Wales skipper Ashley Williams also spoke of Gary Speed sharing that his “thought coming in was I hope he’d be proud of us. He saw us grow up, and what we’ve achieved today. He’s always in the back of our minds. When we achieve something, we think about him.”
Gary Speed only had 10 games at the helm of Wales’ national team, but it was his reign that sparked a team ranked just 117th in the world at the time to be on the brink of European Championship glory. Wales could end the tournament in the top six of the FIFA world rankings. Wales have beaten Slovakia, Northern Ireland, Russia, and Belgium so far at this tournament — their only loss coming in the last minute of the game against England.
All eyes, though, will be on two players — Gareth Bale and Cristiano Ronaldo.
There have been varying reports of a rift between the two superstars during their time at Real Madrid, one that both brush off as competitive spirit rather than animosity. ”We get on very well at Madrid, we enjoy playing with each other,” Bale told media before adding “he’s [Ronaldo] a fantastic player, everybody knows what he can do. But we have always spoken about what we do, what we do ourselves as a team. We don’t worry about the opposition.”
Both are the main-man for their teams in this tournament, Bale with three goals; Ronaldo with two; Bale cost £85 million; Ronaldo £80 million. Bale has scored with 2 of his 5 direct free kicks at Euro 2016; Ronaldo hasn’t scored in his last 41 free kick attempts at seven major tournaments from 2004 until present — It would be understandable if there were to be some fireworks between the two on Tuesday night.
Wales will, however, be without Aaron Ramsey. Ramsey’s individual performances have been immense for Wales thus far at Euro 2016, but his partnerships with Joe Allen, and Joe Ledley have been key to Wales running the show in almost every game that they’ve played at these championships.
It will be key for Wales to replace Ramsey’s presence in the midfield with Chris Coleman likely to turn to Leicester City’s Andy King to fill the Ramsey-sized hole in the Welsh midfield.
Wales and Portugal have never met in a competitive fixture. The last time these two teams met was in the year 2000 when Portugal ran out 3-0 winners. Before that you’d have to go back to 1949, and 1951 for any fixtures between the two nations Portugal winning 3-2 in 1949, and Wales winning in Cardiff in 1951.
Portugal are considered the home team for this match and thus Wales will be relegated to wearing their charcoal-and-lime away strip that they last wore in the loss to England during the group stages. They have worn their traditional red colors in every other game and won. Perhaps this is an omen that their magical run is coming to an end?
Portugal, meanwhile, have played the most games at the European Championships without ever being crowned champions — thirty-three. Cristiano Ronaldo is just a solitary goal shy of Michel Platini’s record of nine goals in the competition. Could the writing be on the cards for Portugal to advance to the final of Euro 2016, and for Ronaldo to equal or better Platini’s record which would almost certainly cement his legacy as one of the greatest players of all time?
Coleman’s Dragons have already achieved the greatest result in their country’s history by beating Belgium 3-1 in the quarter finals. What comes next is a relative unknown, but it wont matter to Wales, nor will it matter that Portugal will be appearing in the final four of a tournament for the seventh time.
Portugal, for this reason, are bettors favorites — but they have yet to win a game in regulation time at Euro 2016 so far.
Chris Coleman said to media “people think the end of this tournament is the end of this journey, but it’s not.” “It’s part of the journey” Coleman explained — “the experience this group of boys will get from this, they’ll be here long after I’m here. This success is part of the learning process.”
Who knows what this will lead to for Welsh soccer. What is evident is that the Dragons are a team who have the belief to achieve the “impossible” at these championships. They’ll draw inspiration from being the underdogs, but they’ll also find it in Coleman’s predecessors words:
“I had a lot of times with Wales when we were getting beat — and beaten well — and you learn to deal with it. You learn that the next time it happens, you roll your sleeves up and give everything for the team.” — Gary Speed, former Wales manager.
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