At the twelfth minute, Deco shifted the play through the middle to Figo. Figo burst down the right again, but Pauleta still hadn't arrived in the box, forcing him to slow down.
Thud!
Su Hang sneaked up from behind, cut off Figo's through pass, and knocked the ball out of bounds.
"Mariano!" Su Hang used the brief pause to give him quick instructions.
Mariano: "Can we not do this face-to-face coaching thing? It feels weird."
Su Hang: "Now's not the time. Listen—Figo's top speed isn't that fast anymore. He won't blow past you. With your pace, you can always recover."
"Just keep constant pressure on him. He no longer has the ability to cut inside from the wing all the way into the box to threaten us. As long as you stop his crosses, we're fine. Understand?"
"As an attacking midfielder he's fierce, but out wide, he's just a budget version of Cristiano Ronaldo."
Mariano nodded.
Figo, meanwhile, looked at Su Hang with a wounded expression.
Figo: Su, you betrayed me!
Su Hang: That's why you shouldn't eavesdrop. If you didn't listen, none of this would've happened.
At the fourteenth minute, Figo really did lose the ball under Mariano's pressure.
Mariano passed to Xavi, who immediately threaded a through ball to Su Hang.
Su Hang absorbed Costinha's challenge to take the pass, but Maniche and Carvalho were already closing in. After what happened against Germany, they weren't about to let Su Hang turn in that zone.
Before the three could trap him, Su Hang shifted the ball to the left flank.
Mariano took it, drove to the end line, and whipped in a cross.
But Meira, towering above everyone, headed it away.
Villa and García were simply too short to contest him.
During that sequence, Portugal adjusted their wingers.
Cristiano Ronaldo and Figo switched flanks.
In the fifteenth minute, Figo received the ball on the left, cut inside, faked a pass to Deco to create separation, then fired from distance… but the shot lacked power, and Casillas caught it easily.
"Figo's close-range dribbling is still razor sharp—nearly impossible to stop. But the issue is his stamina. He can't sustain consecutive dribbles followed by a power shot anymore."
"At this point, playing as an attacking midfielder suits him best. That's why his transition to that role at Real Madrid worked so well—he was no worse than Zidane."
"But Portugal has Deco. And with Deco on the pitch, no one is going to push Figo into the No.10 role."
"Oh! Here we go again!" Queiroz sighed in commentary.
The tempo was simply too fast—attack after attack, with no time for fans to breathe.
This was the highest-quality offensive battle of the tournament so far.
In the twentieth minute, Spain stormed back into Portugal's box.
García passed to the dropping Su Hang before pulling wide. Su Hang and Carvalho clashed again and again as Su Hang forced his way laterally.
It was Carvalho's first real head-on duel with Su Hang this match. He underestimated Su Hang's strength and was shoved behind after a two-hit combo.
Thud!
Su Hang launched a powerful shot mid-dribble.
Portugal's left-back Valente sprinted in and blocked it with a full-body dive.
Valente stayed down for a moment in the box.
At the twenty-second minute, García found Su Hang again. Su Hang laid it off to Xavi, who switched it diagonally to the wing. Mariano sent in yet another cross.
But once again, Meira headed it away.
When Su Hang acted as the pivot, it was hard for him to get into the box in time to contest the first Aerial Duel—particularly with Portugal fielding such a tall center-back.
Portugal countered immediately. Cristiano Ronaldo received the ball on the right and accelerated, tearing into the empty space behind Mariano.
This was exactly why he and Figo swapped positions.
Spain's left side was their main attacking channel. Villa and Su Hang both drifted left, and Mariano loved bombing forward.
But what's strongest can also be the weakest.
When Mariano pushed high, the defensive lane behind him opened up completely.
Figo no longer had the stamina or speed to exploit it.
But Cristiano Ronaldo did.
Boom!
Xavi stepped up to intercept, but Ronaldo tapped the ball past him and exploded away.
Xavi didn't even catch a breath of his tailwind.
Fortunately, Senna read the danger early and slid in, knocking the ball out of play.
Ronaldo leapt over him. The two locked eyes with perfect mutual hostility.
Senna: Try breaking through here again, and I'll break your legs.
Ronaldo: Next time, I'll snap your ankles with a feint.
At the twenty-third minute, the ball went to the left.
Figo and Deco combined with a horizontal one-two, entering the half-space.
Thud!
Figo switched the ball to the right.
Cristiano Ronaldo received again.
Thud!
This time he didn't bother with tricks—just sent in a clean cross.
After years at Manchester United, he'd begun to understand the beauty of simplicity.
Unfortunately, Pauleta again wasn't in position, and the ball skimmed past the far post.
The camera cut to Su Hang, as if telling viewers: if Portugal had a dominant center-forward like Su Hang, they'd have scored who-knows-how-many goals already.
In the twenty-sixth minute, Su Hang received a high pass from Alonso, shrugged off Costinha, spun, and prepared to drive into the box.
But in the next instant, Carvalho slid in hard.
Su Hang jumped instinctively to avoid the tackle.
Yet the referee came over to warn him, signaling that he shouldn't simulate.
Su Hang was speechless.
If he hadn't jumped, he would've been injured.
If he jumped, it was called diving.
What choice did he have?
The camera then cut to Cristiano Ronaldo, as if suggesting: if Su Hang had Ronaldo's speed, reflexes, and dribbling, Spain would've already scored countless goals.
Su Hang: Fence-sitter?
Cristiano Ronaldo: Two-timer?
At the twenty-eighth minute, García unsheathed The Demon Knife, slicing a perfect through ball.
Villa drifted left to receive it, drove toward the byline, and with three sharp feints, shook off Portugal's right-back Miguel before lifting an outside-of-the-foot pass toward Su Hang.
But the pass was too close to goal, letting Ricardo rush out and claim it.
At the thirtieth minute, Cristiano Ronaldo unleashed a chain Stepover on the right, then slipped a nutmeg pass through.
Mariano was utterly humiliated, fully understanding Ramos' earlier suffering.
On the opposite side, Sergio Ramos was practically glowing with joy.
Deco received Ronaldo's pass just outside the box and lofted it to the far post for Figo.
But Sergio Ramos had tracked Figo the whole way. As the ball arrived, he burst ahead of the aging winger and headed it clear.
In just thirty minutes, both teams had fired off an absurd number of attacks.
Against any other opponent, they would've already scored multiple times.
But both defenses were rock-solid, the pace relentless, and despite the nonstop barrage, not a single goal had been scored.
Absurd!