A Bridge to the Next Stage

Benfica wrapped up their participation in the Guadiana tournament in the best way.
Overcoming early deficits in both games, Benfica was perhaps not the best we've seen this pre-season, but effective nonetheless.
Playing their third game in the span of 6 days, along with demanding training in between, Benfica was not the freshest physically. Still, a win is a win, and the team continues to not taste defeat in 4 games, something that adds to the team's confidence level.


JJ continued not to use the whole lot of players at his disposal, limiting himself to 19 to 20 players. In the first game against Atl bilbao JJ fielded the following 11:

Moretto; Maxi Pereira, Miguel Vítor, Roderick and Sepsi composed the back four. Ruben Amorim, Carlos Martins, Fábio Coentrão and Pablo Aimar made up the diamond, with Amorim in the bottom; Cardozo and Saviola were once again the chosen forwards.
Also getting minutes were: Moreira, Yebda, Urreta, and Nuno Gomes.

In the second game:
Moreira; Shaffer, Roderick, Miguel Vítor and Patric were the back four; Yebda, Ruben Amorim, Di María and Aimar were in the midfield, this time with Yebda being the bottom of the diamond; Cardozo and Saviola repeated.

Also getting playing time were: Quim, Maxi, Martins, Coentrao, Urreta and Nuno Gomes.

As you can see not much of a radical change. The center of the defense stayed the same, and the more offensive players remained the same. While on defense the options might have not been many, with both Sidnei and Luiz coming off/going through injuries, JJ opted to give the youngsters playing time.

I'm not going to go into a long and detailed evaluation of both games, but i'll leave some thoughts on both matches.

Bilbao....

While he had showed himself at an interesting level, Moretto ended up voiding his good showing against Shakhtar by showing the spotty Moretto that we all know and fear. Untimely commitments, missed grabs, and incomplete forward saves are everything that doesn't inspire confidence from a goal keeper, and in the first half we saw a bit of all of them.
Off course it wasn't all bad from Moretto, but a keeper that shows that type of inconsistencies, regardless of coming back the next minute and making a world class save, can't be a keeper the defense can trust. The bond of trust between the defense and the goalkeeper is a bond that conditions the way a team plays.
Amorim is not by any means a defensive midfielder and it showed.
Coentrao continues to show why he must be taken seriously as he was once again a determining factor assisting on Benfica's two goals. Saviola continues to show how important he can be to this team, as he scored both goals.
Last year there was a stat that often haunted Benfica, in games where Benfica did not score the first goal, Benfica saw themselves either tying or losing, in a large majority of those games. Taking into consideration that on both these games Benfica was able to turn the scoreboard around, it's something that can't go unnoticed.



Olhanense....
Perhaps Benfica's toughest game of this pre-season so far, Olhanense is a team who resembles 75% of the teams in the Liga Sagres. Not to mention there are 5 players on this team that are on porto's books. The similarities to a Liga Sagres didn't end there as the refereeing closely resembled the very poor quality of Portuguese refereeing, complete with the usual short sighted and invisible calls.
On Benfica, i'm sticking to my initial opinion on Patric as a player to add depth to the position. Shaffer was a little better, but it took him a bit to even out his game. Just like Amorim, Yebda is not a defensive midfielder and his performance seemed to influence the team's performance. DiMaria was back, after an injury but showed himself tired and uninspired, much to Coentrao's delight who was once again in the origin of Benfica's winning goal. Certainly the biggest battle developing at this time. Amorim showed the same type of inspiration, or lack thereof as DiMaria, perhaps showing signs of fatigue, or maybe showing a certain psyche uneasiness as Ramires prepares to join the team. Ramires will most likely be the chosen player to the right side of the midfield and perhaps Amorim's subconscious is anticipating the chance from first team feature to role player.
Cardozo never ceases to amaze, as he pulled the tying goal out of his mysterious bag of tricks.
I also have to mention Miguel Vitor, who has emerged as a serious candidate for the starting job, he might lack the finesse and the swagger, but he proves to be very effective. Some of his decisions still show his age, nonetheless a talent to be taken into consideration, not to mention he has been injury free. His winning goal that gave Benfica the trophy, his first as a senior team member, reminds me of the goal David Luiz scored against Sporting a couple years ago when Benfica won this tournament the last time.

As I have written, not the best of performances, or maybe not one in line with pre-season progression, but still an important triumph. Fatigue was definitely a factor, but that same fatigue was also there for the opposing team who had played the day before, and although fatigue can't be used as an excuse, it definitely conditioned the team's performance.