大象传媒

Neuchatel - 678 miles travelled

Some you win, some you lose.

I rushed to Neuchatel, the home of the Portuguese team, on Thursday to get further reaction to the news that Luiz Felipe Scolari would take over as after the tournament.

I met 大象传媒 Radio 5 Live reporter Mike Sewell outside the media centre and prepared to head into the hustle and bustle of a feeding frenzy as journalists gorged on the biggest news story to come out of the tournament to date.

Only there was nobody in there at all apart from a sound engineer preparing for a scheduled press conference that had already been cancelled.

"I am the last to know anything," he lamented.

The only action taking place involved a group of kids having a kickabout in the car park and some locals getting stuck into a round of crazy golf on the shore of Lake Neuchatel.

Eventually, a Brazilian journalist turned up and told us there was some activity outside , where the Portuguese team are staying.

The term media blackout has been taken to new levels at the aforementioned hotel, with a huge black fence surrounding the entirety of the hotel's perimeter.

Camera crews had been positioned by the exit hoping to film any comings and goings and had so far accrued two nuggets of information to share with their viewers.

One - Luiz Felipe Scolari went for a walk this morning without speaking to anyone.

Two - Cristiano Ronaldo had gone out in a car with blacked out windows.

The nearby square was also home to a liberal sprinkling of camera crews desperate for any sort of reaction. The Portuguese and English contingents were taking it in turns asking each other for their thoughts. In fact, so acute was the need for any sort of way of filling airtime that I was even asked if I would do an interview for Portuguese television station .

Of course, when I turned up at the arranged time to do the interview, the presenter had obviously seen sense and was nowhere to be seen.

On one occasion, the Portuguese team coach stopped close by and supporters ran towards it with the desperation of someone craving the toilet after a red hot vindaloo. It turned out there were no players on it and I suspect the driver had probably been to the petrol station.

I, myself, was no exception to this thirst for knowledge and had spoken to several Portugal fans to canvas their opinions on developments. One group I saw at the train station in Geneva this morning took a lot of persuading that Chelsea had actually got their man. Another supporter insisted that he really did not speak enough English but, when pressed, came out with the line: "Scolari, he is less polemic than Jose Mourinho."

I also had a word with SIC's Luis Marcal before his crew did their disappearing act and he had some pretty interesting things to say about Scolari.

For Marcal, the legacy of the Brazilian is that he transformed the Portuguese into a people who love their national team. Before his appointment, said Marcal, they tended to be fans of their clubs first and foremost.

Several supporters echoed this sentiment and argued that Scolari had built his team his way, certainly without kowtowing to the media. Say what you like about Scolari, his time at Chelsea should definitely make for compulsive viewing.

I get the feeling that quite a lot of the Portuguese media knew something was going to happen but were taken aback by the timing of the announcement. Scolari had previously said that he would say nothing about his future until the end of the tournament - and that the same would apply to star man Ronaldo.

"He lied about that," concluded Marcal, who thinks the news about Scolari could affect the environment in the team hotel.

What price the agents of Ronaldo, Deco and Ricardo Carvalho suddenly moving into view?

Talking of Carvalho, he ran into a spot of bother today when he went for a walk without his ID. When he tried to get back into the team hotel, he spent several minutes persuading the security guard to believe who he said he was.

Scolari or no Scolari, Marcal was in a very good mood, having persuaded Ronaldo to wind down his car window as he was driven out of the hotel.

"Is everything alright?" he asked.

"Yes, everything is alright," replied Ronaldo, who sought to illustrate his point by giving a thumbs-up.

Sometimes, when you're feeding on scraps, the man with the thumbs-up is king.

p.s - My moment in the sun did come later on Thursday when I was interviewed by Portuguese Radio Clube. Desperation for opinion had hit new lows.

p.p.s - Hotel Beau-Rivage is not the exclusive retreat of the Portugal team during Euro 2008. An old lady, who lives there permanently, remains on site. It would have taken a particularly callous hotel manager to boot her out for four weeks.

p.p.p.s - Miguel Monterio and Ricardo Quaresma clearly weren't too affected by the Scolari saga. They spent the afternoon shopping in Geneva.