A dream Euro 2016 final for Eder saw Portugal lift the silverware taking captain Cristiano Ronaldo one up in the comparisons with Lionel Messi that seem to be particularly rife these past few days. A man who notched up zero goals in almost 15 registered appearances for Swansea turned out to be the unlikely player to score a match winner as Portugal went on to win the tournament despite winning only one match in the stipulated 90 minutes of normal time.
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His side, Lille OSC, were less than amused when their player scored to eventually defeat the hosts and the country that Lille belongs to. While no one can say that France did not deserve to win, Portugal succeeded in showing the world that they were neither a disintegrated side and nor did they depend on one player to achieve results.
Portugal's form this tournament has been less than impressive. From the very start, they seemed unsure of themselves and most matches involving them went into penalty shootouts where they finally ended up winning. While a section of football pundits may argue that the defensive style Portugal employs show a massive amount of determination and fortitude on the part of the team, it might be seen that ultimately there were a lot of teams who were better than Portugal.
Also Read: EURO 2016: Portugal lift the trophy as Eder's heroics in extra time gives them 1-0 win over France
This fact was not lost on the section of French supporters as well as local supporters of Lille OSC who came out in numbers to bash Eder for only doing the job for his country. The tendency of a vast section of French supporters to call for Eder's immediate contract termination from Lille shows a very ugly and unreasonable side of the game of football. Club and country loyalties lie on two different levels and it would be quite unacceptable for one to interfere with the other; a fact and sentiment that most of these football supporters do not seem to be able to comprehend- or maybe they were just being jokingly outrageous.
It all started when the official account of Lille OSC contributed a tweet expressing sadness on Eder's shot in a tweet that translates to “And Eder scores.”
This was followed by a major amount of online hate for the man who is very surely going to be given a hero’s welcome back in Portugal.
(Translated to: “Dirty traitor Eder, first the arm and then this shot.” ; referring to Mark Clattenburg’s potentially costly error when he carded Laurent Koscielny after the ball actually hit Eder’s arm. Portugal very nearly scored from the resulting freekick.)
(Translated to: “Immediate contract termination is as good a solution as any.”)
(Translated to: “ We must think of an emergency solution to end his contract because he cannot play in France.”)
This madness needs to be realised and stopped as soon as possible, and it will be interesting to see just how Eder fits into the scheme of things when he does return to Lille for next season.
