Fabio Vieira and Nuno Tavares have been selected by Portugal for the upcoming Uefa Under-21 European Championships in Romania and Georgia.
Portugal face Georgia in the tournament opener next Wednesday before concluding their group with matches against the Netherlands and Belgium.
The knockout stages start on 1 July and the final is on 8 July. Should the Gunners duo make it that far, they, like Emile Smith Rowe, who has been called up by England, will likely miss the start of Arsenal’s pre-season preparations.
Vieira had a somewhat underwhelming debut season at Emirates Stadium. Signed out of the blue from Porto, Mikel Arteta was excited by the midfielder’s potential but he ended up making just three starts in the Premier League. He showed flashes of his talent in the Europa League but ended the season feeding off scraps in the closing stages of matches.
Playing for his country affords him an opportunity to build momentum heading into the new season although missing a chunk of our summer preparations (for a second successive year) isn’t ideal.
Tavares was a regular fixture in Marseille’s starting lineup during his recent loan spell.
Playing predominantly as a wing-back, he scored six goals in 39 appearances in total. His erratic performances, particularly in the second half of the campaign, mean a permanent transfer is unlikely.
Re-integration at Arsenal seems far-fetched so he could well be shipped out on loan again or sold, if we can find a buyer.
Here’s to hoping Viera can kick on. Getting more minutes out of him would be a boost regardless of the business we end up doing in midfield.
Both are aged 23. Do FIFA not understand what Under 21 means?
Or UEFA?
It’s the under or over 21s Euros
FIFA & UEFA are clowns but their underage rules isn’t a reason to bash them…..if you are underage when qualifying begins you are eligible to play in the finals. Otherwise it would be chaos.
Thanks. It is still a bit weird, isn’t an under 21 player aged 20, 19, 18 etc?
I’m sure someone on here said the way it works is that you’re not 21 until you go above 20.
You can’t expect national teams to spend 2 years trying to qualify for a tournament & then if they qualify, have to pick a completely different team for the tournament….
Like the school year, it’s done by calendar years, not literally date of birth.
Players born after 1 January 2000 are eligible.
It’s for players born on or after 1 January 2000,
I really like what I have seen of Vieira to date. But what I will say is this: We should sign Mitoma for £80m because he has been able to play regularly and shown he can do it. Then id like to see us criticise Arsenal hierarchy for not signing Mitoma when he was cheaper. Even though mitoma wouldn’t have made the first team regularly for us he’d surely have got tons of goals and assists during the fleeting appearances as a sub. And if he didn’t then I’d like to criticise him for not proving himself during limited and… Read more »
“I really like what I have seen of Vieira to date.”, I wish you were my teacher in school.
I totally get that people demand instant success and anything else is failure – but personally I’ve seen enough to know that he is a very exciting prospect. Yes he’s a bit lightweight but I can see serious football intelligence – and that is something that cannot be taught (whereas bulking up and the positional awareness that comes with experience can be added with relative ease)
And, he’s got a deceptive turn of pace. He’ll come very-good, I’m sure. Here, or elsewhere.
touché
I don’t care if a player costs 100M quid or 5M quid (I don’t give a fk about Arsenal’s or football’s finances because the whole system is completely broken and fraudulent – all fucked up by mega rich greedy fkwits). The key part is the talent identification and improving the squad. I also really rate Mitoma – classy player. As an Aussie I’d perhaps seen him more than many in Asian international play. Personally, I’d rather Mitoma than Havertz (the talent is clear, but he just seems too precious and full of himself and his beauty). But if Arteta really… Read more »
I agree with some of your points and others not so much. Rice we absolutely have to sign – this guy takes us to the next level in various different ways – for me he is worth £100m: Havertz is a really interesting one. When Chelsea signed him I was crushed as I felt he was exactly what we needed – but now we may be signing him I’m quite surprised. That said, as a team that is looking to dominate via possession and essentially play two no.10s ahead of a 6 with an inverted left back filling into double… Read more »
Good talk. I kinda feel similar about Havertz. It’s clear to see why he’s an attractive prospect for this project. If he applied himself, he could be absolutely world class. I harbour concerns about the application. We don’t need headcases fucking things up. But if he fully buys in and returns to top form, yeah, he’s ideal. He can spell basically the whole front 4 and provide something a little different to the existing top picks (Marty, Gabi, Saka, Jesus). RB, I’m pretty concerned about Tomi and I feel White will play more CB this coming season to ease the… Read more »
I’ve provided a detailed response on this but for some reason it has been put in the review folder. Probably due to the comparisons I drew with Stefan kuntz
mitoma has had one decent season and is very one-footed. i would argue everyone in the brighton team overperformed this past season and buying a player who plays in a position we are already stacked in (LWF) for 80m is pretty ridiculous, considering we have more pressing matters to address in the midfield (those same issues that have been around since last summer’s window opened).
Vieira must go out on loan. Not even close enough to play as a sub in the league cup. Tavares looks like another problem child Ganduzi. Ship him out Asap.
I imagine you were one of the ones saying the same about martinelli not so long ago – and probably saying MO8 didn’t do enough during his loan to justify a permanent deal
I am the one that watched the games he played not looking for up votes.
So you watched the Brentford game where Vieira lit things up – but he’s not good enough to even be a sub in a league cup game?
I watched every game he played in. Overall he is not good enough to play for us. Maybe you should watch more games.
Tavarez started very very well at Marseille. He probably scored his 6 goals in 10 games or so. Had a bit of attitude problem at the end of the season not trying hard in training if he was on the bench in the previous game.
I’m not sure what will happen with taveres – but similar to above – he was a bit of a punt and was perhaps not ready for the expectations that were placed upon him (similar also to Sambi). I’d like to see him go out on loan in England (I’ve seen West Ham mentioned)
I didn’t follow it very closely, but it seemed like he was a big success at first–I thought he started every match, scored and assisted regularly, often very highly rated on WhoScored. Then it all disappeared. Marseille is not an easy place to play if you have an attitude problem. Big club with huge fan base, not all of whom are known for their patience. (It’s one of the reasons Saliba’s success there was so impressive.) Tavares very obviously has lots of raw talent, can energise a game, make life difficult for opponents. I hope he doesn’t throw it all… Read more »
I watch a fair bit of Ligue 1. Marseille began the season with deploying their full backs almost as wingers – in this situation taveres thrived. The problem is he is not very able defensively and he does not come across as being very coachable (compare that to Saka who can pretty much do whatever a coach asks of him). The easy conclusion is that he has an attitude problem – which perhaps he does – but it takes maturity to be able to accept advice and not see it as criticism – and perhaps he does not have that… Read more »
I think the problem Tavares has is that his positives are enough to give you some quality moments…. but his negatives are so strong that those moments would need to happen all the time to outweigh them. He was never going to keep scoring at the rate he did at the start – his defensive cluelessness (& that’s what it is, he isn’t a defender who ‘makes mistakes’ , he just has no idea at all how to defend) was still there & doesn’t seem to have improved at all in his time away…once the goals dried up….people in France… Read more »
tavares certainly isn’t lacking in confidence, but he needs to improve his concentration if he’s going to make it as a defender at the top level.