Paulo Sousa says Carlos Queiroz deserves praise for mining the talents of Portugal's 'Golden Generation'.
Sousa explains why Portugal's youngsters are better than England's
Paulo Sousa may have been part of Portugal's 'Golden Generation', but he says Carlos Queiroz deserves the plaudits for mining their talents.
One of the most celebrated Portuguese players of recent years, Sousa played alongside the likes of Luis Figo and Rui Costa in the impressive Portugal national side of the 1990s.
The team went on to reach the final of Euro 2004, as well as the semi-finals of Euro 2000 and World Cup 2006, but Sousa insists it was the foundations laid by Queiroz in the early 1990s that set them on the road to success.
The former Manchester United assistant manager is back in the Portugal hotseat, having coached the team from 1991 to 1993 and also leading the national Under-20 side to success.
And speaking on Goals on Sunday, Sousa said it was his vision that allowed the 'Golden Generation' to thrive.
"The person who gave us all of these things was Carlos Queiroz," Sousa said.
"He was the man who created a programme and a project for 10 years - and of course the Federation gave all the power to build this kind of thing in Portugal.
"He identified the type of player he wanted to achieve important things, he started to create a Portuguese style.
"That is an organised team playing on the counter-attack because at that moment we recognised we were not competitive like England, Spain, Italy, France or Germany.
"Why did important midfield players like Luis Figo, Rui Costa and me start to come in? Because we were organised well and we were looking for one-against-one continuously during the game.
"Good passes, good crosses and we arrived into the box, attacked the space, and score goals."
Success
Many people would suggest Portugal should have won a major tournament in the last decade, but Sousa said that reaching the latter stages could be considered a success for a small country.
"When you build something you need to have time to achieve," he continued.
"For example, France started to win things after they invested in the French colonies, players coming to France to build a European mentality and to build a team to be competitive and win important things.
"Don't forget in Portugal we have 10million people. It's a small country, it's not easy. It's difficult to win something important.
"We are always in the competitions like the World Cups and the European Championships and this is very important.
"It's very important for the national team of Portugal to go to these competitions and arrive in the semi-finals or the quarter-finals because it gets you money to reinvest in youth."
Age
The current QPR manager also said he agreed with the idea that Portuguese players are more comfortable on the ball than their English counterparts.
He said it's down to the fact that Portugal's youngsters are given a different mentality from an early age.
He said: "It's true because kids do that from the beginning, from five or six years old they are playing in a free role.
"We invest a lot into one-against-one, defensively and attacking, and looking to change positions a lot.
"It's difficult to mark someone and control someone in a team when he changes position a lot. We don't care if players stay in their position because each one can do each role and understand it.
"We also do a lot with the ball because the team that controls the ball controls the game."