How does one assess when a successful pathway was created?
Or is just talent or genes?

Portugal is a very small country, barely surpassing 10 Million people.

There are cities in many countries – as Brazil, USA, not to mention the Asian countries where Football is not so popular – with more people than Portugal.

Spain, just on the border is almost crossing the line of getting 50 Million people.

France and Italy, the closest after Nuestros Hermanos have 68 Million and 59 Million respectively.

Yet, Portugal is competing with these nations, among others as Germany, England or Netherlands in European Youth Stages.

In the last 10 years, Portugal was in 9 finals of UEFA Youth Tournaments U17’s, U19’s and U21’s, winning 3 (including last days’ win and with 2 competitions starting soon).

These constant supply of talent, made the 1st Team to win their first-ever Mens European Championship in 2016 and the UEFA Nations League in 2019.

So, now that we know the results, let’s try to understand the causes.

For me it’s clear – competitiveness.

Worldwide, the margins for becoming a Professional Footballer are most likely less than 1%.

From those 1%, not all Professionals become rich and popular, just make Football their professional career.

But there’s a (very small) margin within those 1% that become super famous and rich.

And that feeds the crowd!

As I normally say, in Portugal, the unexpected professional that came from nowhere and made his/her way through professional stages, reaching places no one could perceive before, sometimes even when they started in lower Divisions already as adults and achieve a big title – that story will feed the millions behind them.

The prize may not be only financial, but of perseverance, fight, recognition and status.

Therefore emotions – a crucial element in Football.

However, sometimes, it’s exactly that emotion that leaves you behind.

Specially when you have these results from countries with significant input from expats, mainly African origin in the case of Portugal, with different cultures and backgrounds – some even associated with age scandals that have a direct impact on the teams’ performances, but also on the ability to provide opportunities to other players.

One would wonder that, in order to protect the local (national) talent, one should legislate, establish rules to avoid the exploitation of corrupt agents, Clubs or others.

Seems logical.

Regardless, Portugal seems to choose a different path – almost total freedom.

There are some common ground rules, specially when it comes to the young players where the European Union, UEFA and FIFA rules apply normally, just as in the Professional Football to have a certain amount of “Developed Local Players”, which stands by having players that were registered with the Portuguese FA at any point between the age of 15 and 21 for 3 Seasons, in the squad.

Yes, in the total squad.

It doesn’t mean they have to be playing.

If you want to play with 11 South Africans or Russians, you can.

That creates a system where, regardless the nationality or background, the tunnel tights more and more as you get older from a young player, creating more challenges and shaping the ones that really get to the top of the ladder successfully.

I like to see it as the Marketing people states it when they speak about Qualifying Leads.

It’s better to make questions, provoke answers, be clear and transparent to make sure you’ve done your best in guaranteeing that you found the right person, or the right person found you (or your services/products in the case of Marketing).

Youth Football is very similar, in terms of processes.

Yes, you lose many and you’ll make mistakes.

But, truth to be said, you will lose them, eventually regardless you like it more or less.

One needs to understand that getting to professional stages is different than we think.

You must be shaped differently, face adversities differently, work at a different rate to sustain there, adapt faster, be quicker, smarter and resilient.

The other day, I was watching Rafinha, the Right-Back that won multiple titles at Bayern Münich, Olympiakos, Flamengo, Sāo Paulo, Flamengo, etc, getting emotional when interviewing Marquinhos and his family after PSG’s Champion League Title.

And he was emotional just because he knew how Marquinhos and his family worked, sacrificed and suffered to be at that moment of glory.

So, in summary, my point of reflection here is simple – Free the Market, create Competitiveness and wait for Glory to come.

Although, it may hurt individually, myself included as a young footballer full of dreams and achieved almost none as a player, it creates an atmosphere where the best of the bests, in terms of quality and character, reach the top.

I just wished other Departments of the Country (Portugal) could learn from Football, in this case.

What’s you thoughts on this?

Should we protect the local players with more restrictions for expats?
Or should we Free the Markets?

Let me know your thoughts on the comments!