Portugal’s key, now, is to re-light the fire of Cristiano Ronaldo and Sporting’s halcyon past

Ian Hawkey writes that in addition to Cristiano Ronaldo, if Portugal can rediscover the best of the likes of Ricardo Quaresma and Nani they might yet have potential at Euro 2016.

Portugal's Cristiano Ronaldo reacts during his team's draw against Austria in their Euro 2016 Group F match on Saturday. Darren Staples / Reuters / June 18, 2016

At Sporting CP's headquarters in Alcochete, just outside Lisbon, they take a justifiable pride in how they teach a young man to strike a dead ball. And the more senior, long-serving coaches there had been congratulating themselves, watching the European Championship, on the deft, clean, effective way in which one of their graduates has being doing it.

Unfortunately for Portugal's Selecao, the national team, the best free-kick struck by a former sportinguista in France over the last ten days has been Eric Dier's. Dier, who grew up in Portugal, and spent his formative years as an apprentice footballer with Sporting, plays for England, for whom he struck that country's opening goal of the championships, from outside the box, over a Russian defensive wall.

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Sporting’s most celebrated alumnus meanwhile, Portugal’s most prolific goalscorer in history? He has so far drawn a blank.

And his dead-ball expertise ... well, poor Cristiano Ronaldo keeps being reminded that in his long history of participation in major international tournaments, which dates back to Euro 2004, he has had 36 attempts at goal with direct free-kicks. And he has scored none.

Ronaldo’s missed penalty in the 0-0 draw with Austria last Saturday has put him under scrutiny.

Portugal, with two points from two matches so far, take on the Group F leaders Hungary on Wednesday night under threat of elimination from Euro 2016 altogether. Head coach Fernando Santos has tough decisions to make on how true he remains to what had looked a bold, enterprising strategy of entrusting a gifted quartet of Sporting graduates to give Portugal their firepower.

Ronaldo and Joao Moutinho are two of them, long given responsibility for leading the Portugal forward line and midfield, respectively. Then there are the wilder cards, Ricardo Quaresma and Nani.

Those who remember Quaresma from his brief, unfulfilling spell in the Arabian Gulf League with Al Ahli in 2013 may be surprised to see the eternal enigma of Portuguese football at Euro 2016 with his country, and indeed in the starting line-up. They may be surprised to see him looking so lean, too.

Quaresma is 32, and has hopscotched around the wealthiest leagues of the sport so restlessly and generally with such an inconsistent level of performance that it always a surprise when he is invited back to a previous employer. He only had one chance at Chelsea, and at Barcelona, but his revival over the past two years has been achieved via a second stint at FC Porto and, more recently, at Besiktas in Istanbul, where he has just won a league title.

Quaresma and Ronaldo in the same Portugal team was an idea that once thrilled followers of Sporting. But that was a while ago.

Time was that they were precocious, inventive, fabulously gifted young teenagers in green-and-white hoops together. Indeed Quaresma’s portfolio of tricks seemed even greater than the younger Ronaldo’s.

The famous story is that Alex Ferguson, then manager of Manchester United, was in a dilemma over which dazzling tyro to sign from Sporting in 2003, Quaresma, or Ronaldo. He chose the latter. The rest is history.

The other bit of United history is that United went back to Sporting for another trickster after Ronaldo had made his name in Manchester. That was Nani, who is still capable of the breath-taking manoeuvre and the match-winning moment. Portugal fans, though sometimes impatient with Nani, know he can swing tight games.

By playing Nani and Quaresma along with the captain Ronaldo, Santos is looking to solve an enduring conundrum: How can Portugal get the best out of Ronaldo? And: In the absence of a top-rank centre-forward, a perennial problem for the national team, should they rather trust in an abundance of creative skill, gamble with a front three of players not best known for tracking back and their work when their team does not have possession.

The trouble is, time is running out to gain an answer.

Nani’s goal, in the 1-1 draw against Iceland, is the only one Portugal have scored in the competition so far.

"Ronaldo has hardly slept since he missed the penalty," Santos told compatriot reporters. But if the best of Ronaldo, and indeed his ex-sportinguista sidekicks, can be awoken from now on, then the Portuguese might yet have plenty to show to France.

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