Looking in on the Dallas Cup - 4 - Updated

The Benfica juniors have ended their run in the Dallas cup losing to Liverpool by the score of 2-1. Liverpool who had annihilated the competition up until this point(7-1,9-0,5-1) seemed to have found their match in Benfica, being able to defeat Benfica by the samallest of margins, in a game in which Benfica was called "a tricky side" on the Liverpool official site. That is all the info i could gather, in the meantime if any other information surfaces i will be sure to add to the post.
Details on the game
From the Dallas Morning News

Andras Simon took advantage of Benfica goalkeeper's bobble to score the first goal in the 35th minute.

But Benfica struck back in the second half. David Simao scored from 30 yards away in the 61st minute. Boti Demel almost did the same from outside the box a few minutes later, but his shot bounced off the right post.

Liverpool turned the game around late and became more aggressive on offense. Benfica couldn't hold Liverppol off, and Nememi escaped on the left side, setting up Flynn's winning goal.

Original Article

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Out of this tournament we have witnessed the emergence of Fellipe Bastos as a real promise. The Brazilian 18 year old, earned praises from Junior coach Joao Alves,who labeled Fellipe a real talent that can fight for a starting spot in the senior squad next year.
If you recall Fellipe Bastos joined Benfica last January but due to his 18th birthday falling on February 1st(one day after the deadline to sign players) has not been able to compete. Despite his young age, Bastos has been a permanent fixture in first team training and was even hailed as the future by Camacho. He has been characterized as a strong center mid, being able to play both a defensive and an offensive midfield position, with emphasis on his box-2-box qualities.
Also out of this tournament, is the confirmed emergence of David Simao, a player that is often called to the training squad, and has even been part of some game rosters this year.

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Looking in on the Dallas Cup - 3

Having already qualified for the semifinals, Benfica played their last game of the group stages this wednesday against Mexico's Guadalajara. The final score was 2-2.
The semifinals are now set, on one side there will be Monterrey and Tigres, both teams from Mexico, and Benfica will play Liverpool, who have tallied a total of 21 goals in their 3 games of the group stages. The games will take place on Friday, with the Benfica game being the late game at 10pm est.
As of this moment this is all the info i could access, if anyone knows goal scorers and line ups please leave them on the comment box.

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Looking in on the Dallas Cup - 2

Benfica's Juniors beat Frankfurt's Eintracht today by the score of 4-2 to clinch a spot in the semifinals where they will meet the winner of bracket B. Most likely Liverpool who currently leads bracket B with 6 points.
Benfica leads Bracket C with 6 points, 4 points ahead of second place Guadalajara from Mexico, a team that Benfica will meet on the last fixture of group stages.

Benfica's 1-0 victory over Vancouver Whitecaps, came at the expense of David Simao's and his 35yd strike. David Simao has often been part of the the senior team training squad.
On the score sheet against Eintracht were Fillipe Bastos, Toumany, Demel e Wang.

As you may recall, Bastos has been training with the senior squad ever since Benfica acquired him. The Brazilian u-19 national team captain, missed the signing deadline stipulated by the Portuguese League by a couple of days, due to his birthday and Benfica was unable to sign the player as a senior. Joao Alves decided to take Bastos to the Dallas Cup where he apparently has been dominating the competition from the defensive mid slot.

Next Match will be on Wednesday the 19th where Benfica will meet Guadalajara at Pizza Hut park the home of MLS' FC Dallas.

Current Standings and Results

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Looking in on the Dallas Cup

The Benfica Junior team beat Whitecaps Residency from Vancouver by the score of 1-0.
Benfica will play Frankfurt's Eintrach today.
Click on the link below to read an article about the game, courtesy of Frank Cunha at the Talksoccer.com Benfica forum.

Residency fall to Benfica in Dallas Cup
March 16, 2008

Whitecaps Residency battle with Benfica in their opening Super Group game at Dallas Cup XXIX on Sunday.Vancouver Whitecaps FC Residency fell 1-0 to Portuguese giants Benfica in their opening U-19 Super Group game at Dallas Cup XXIX.

Despite creating some excellent chances in the first half and having a goal from a set-piece disallowed in the dying stages, a fine second-half strike from Benfica earned them an opening victory in Bracket C at Dallas' Richland College.

A bright and windy day in Texas greeted both teams for the Sunday afternoon contest, with Thomas Niendorf's side very unlucky not to have taken the lead inside the opening couple of minutes, as an unmarked Randy Edwini-Bonsu was unable to hit the target from 10 yards out.

Though Benfica had plenty of possession in the opening 45 minutes, it was the Whitecaps that looked far more dangerous on the counter-attack, with several more chances created by Vancouver before halftime. Their European opponents, however, held firm to take a goalless draw to the break.

The decisive moment of the match came on 62 minutes, as a Benfica player made a run from the halfway line before hitting a sublime 35-yard strike past Residency goalkeeper Simon Thomas for 1-0. The scoreline allowed the Portuguese youngsters to use a few 'professional tactics' against the Whitecaps, as the seemed satisfied enough with the one-goal result.

The Whitecaps, however, remained undeterred and pressed to find an equalizer late on. Second-half substitute Drew Russell struck a header off the target with ten minutes remaining before Navid Mashinchi also failed to test the Benfica goalkeeper with a free-kick effort.

Vancouver then thought they had finally broken through in the last minute of the game. From a free kick, the Benfica keeper spilled the set-piece in the box before the Whitecaps were able to knock it over the goal-line. In the melee, the keeper had fallen over Whitecaps substitute Kyle Porter, and the referee deemed the collision to be a foul on the Benfica shot-stopper – thus disallowing the Whitecaps goal.

Despite the disappointment of losing Sunday's contest, Niendorf felt much will be learned by his team. "I thought we played a good game," he told whitecapsfc.com from Dallas. "The windy conditions made it a challenge for both teams. Benfica were a well-organized and physical team, but we were unfortunate not to take our opportunities when we had them. Playing teams with the qualities of Benfica is important for our players. That is why we are here."

The German tactician also felt a draw would have been a fair result after viewing a replay of the late disallowed goal. "I've just looked at it again on video, and the goal looked good to us," he said.

In the other Bracket C match at Richland College, Germany's Eintracht Frankfurt drew 1-1 with Mexico's Chivas Guadalajara.

Whitecaps Residency will now prepare for their second game on Monday, as they play Chivas Guadalajara at Richland College. Kickoff is 10am Pacific Daylight Time.

For the Whitecaps to reach next Friday's semifinals, they must win Bracket C or claim the wildcard place from the three groups competing this week.

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Benfica News for 12/12/07

Taking a look through the major Portuguese Sport online Dailies:

Portuguese Cup drawing - Benfica drew Feirense at home for the 5 round of the portuguese cup. Feirense is currently 12th in the Vitalis League ( Portugal's second flight). Porto drew Desportivo das Aves, which will have Romeu Ribeiro, Miguel Victor and Dabao in their squad by the time the game takes place, January 20th.

Quim's back in practice. Benfica's #1 trained without limitations this morning and will be ready for this weekend's clash against Belenenses.

Miguel Victor will play with the Juniors for a couple more games before joining Desportivo das Aves in January. Benfica's junior coach, Joao Alves, requested that Victor give his contribution to the junior squad after losing a few of his defensive players to injuries. Victor played this last weekend, and will play another 2 games for the junior squad before going on his loan.

Binya has been called by the Cameroonian national team to play a friendly against a Galiza select squad. This is another game where Otto Pfister will have a chance to look at players before making his CAN 08 roster official. Binya might very well be on this roster list, which would mean that Benfica wouldn't be able to count on Binya for at least the month of January and some of February.

Benfica is trying to acquire the rest of Cardozo's pass from Newell's (20% = 2.2mm). Bergessio is most likely going to be included in the deal for the buyout in the form of a loan or even a sale. Benfica is also trying to acquire the other 20% of DiMaria's pass from Rosario Central.. just a quick explanation of these percentages that are usually left on the table. Buying clubs do this to cut the price, agreeing to leave a percentage of the players pass with the team they bought the player from, what this means is that any future deals involving the player would guarantee the first seller a percentage of the sale, in this case 20%. This is clear move by Benfica to secure future talent, while anticipating to make money with these two players, buying the 20% would naturally maximize Benfica's return.

Cesar Delgado, remains quiet as far as his move to Benfica goes. The player told the Mexican media he would not talk about the move until it's official. The player also denied having any kind of agreement with Benfica. Also in the race are Lyon, Palermo, Olympiacos and Espanhol.

here's a clip of Delgado

Leo's representatives are in Lisbon this week to discuss contract renovations with Benfica. Brazil's Fluminense is following the meetings very carefully as they would be Leo's next home if Leo and Benfica fail to reach an agreement.

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Benfica Weekend Review

Benfica traveled to Madeira this past Friday to face Nacional, in a game that was part of the festivities belonging to the inauguration of the Cristiano Ronaldo Futebol Campus. Benfica came away with the win with Dabao getting the winning goal in the closing minutes.
Camacho started the following players:
Butt in goal; Luis Felipe, Edcarlos, David Luiz and Ruben Lima; Romeu Ribeiro played defensive mid, Andres Diaz, Assis and Coentrao composed the more advanced line of midfield. Up front it was Di Maria supporting Bergessio. Also making appearances in the game were: Moreira, David Simao, Andre Carvalhas, Mantorras and Yu Dabao. While the game served as a celebration for the madeira team, the biggest celebration has to come from Benfica fan's everywhere. Not only for the victory, despite of not counting for anything, but for what the game really meant. Let's examine:
- Moreira's first official match since suffering a knee injury that has kept him out of the team for a lengthy period of time. Moreira has been the darling of many Benfiquista's and is the choice of many to be Benfica's number 1. Seeing him in action again has certainly brough joy to many Benfiquistas.
- David Luiz's return, and what a return! Safe, secure, with a man of the match type of performance. It won't be too long before he is playing next to Luisao.
- Juniors: Ruben Lima, Andre Carvalhas and David Simao all made their first team debut and showed where Benfica's future lies. Let's not forget that Romeu Ribeiro and Miguel Victor are also juniors still. With this type of talent, the future is bright and as a Benfiquista i can only be happy with the fact that there are youngsters being brought up through our youth system that are future senior team players.
Mantorras - it's always nice to see the Angolan international come into the game and make a difference. The Benfica goal comes from Mantorras' long distance shot, that Dabao puts away after the ball rebounded off the crossbar.
Even tough it was Nacional's night to celebrate, Benfiquista's everywhere should eb the ones celebrating for the reasons i just mentioned above

On Saturday, The US national team beat South Africa by the score of 1-0 with an assist of Freddy Adu which started for the Americans. Also on Saturday, Petit told the media that he will be ready to integrate training this starting week and may even be 100% to play the Academica match (countdown on the side)

On Sunday, Christian Rodriguez, started in Uruguay's WC qualifier against Chile, in a match that ended in a draw

Remember these faces:
Simao, Carvalhas, Lima

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