When Portugal celebrated victory in the final of Euro 2016, in the Stade de France, along with the roars of delight there could be heard the distinct whelp of underdogs.
They had just beaten the hosts. They had played most of the 120 minutes of their 1-0, extra-time victory without their star player.
The winning goal had been struck by the unsung Eder, a substitute coming off a season he had begun as a non-scoring centre-forward at Swansea City and ended on loan at Lille.
With Cristiano Ronaldo giving urgent orders from the technical area, his knee hurt from an eighth minute clash, Portugal's mongrels growled, and a front six made up of players employed by Lisbon’s second-best club, Sporting, or in the Turkish league, or by clubs who had the previous season finished off the pace in the French league triumphed over a France whose search for a late equaliser was in the hands of thoroughbreds, footballers from Juventus, Bayern Munich, Paris Saint-Germain, Atletico Madrid and Manchester United.
Fast forward some 51 weeks and the Portugal who take on the holders of the Copa America, Chile, in the first Confederations Cup semi-final in Kazan on Wednesday, have a very different sort of tailoring about them.
Their front six today will probably include a trio of players who competed in the last four of the latest Champions League, boast men with freshly minted medals from the Spanish Liga or French Ligue 1.
Rather than coming from Lille and Fenerbahce, Portugal's attackers will carry lustrous business cards from Real Madrid, Barcelona, Manchester City and AC Milan.
Some heavy price-tags hang off them. The fee City agreed last month with Monaco for the purchase of the diminutive Bernardo Silva may rise to close to €70 million (Dh289.3m) if he reaches some of the targets City believe he can in their colours.
Andre Silva, meanwhile, has just cost Milan a shade under €40m, a sum the former Porto striker can assume means they have him pencilled in as first-choice centre-forward for the coming Serie A campaign.
Neither of these Silvas was in France last summer, and hindsight encourages the idea that the stodgy Portugal who won the tournament with only one victory within 90 minutes in their entire Euro 2016 might have had a bit more panache had they been there.
But both were only 20 at the time, Bernardo Silva had fitness issues and Andre Silva had spent more of the 2015-16 season with Porto’s B squad than with the first team.
His last nine months have been a revelation. He scored goals for Porto at a rate of a goal every 150 minutes in league and Uefa Champions League and if Milan, ambitious to recover their status with new Chinese backers, had any doubt about his confidence then his goal in the 4-0 win over New Zealand at this Confederations Cup will have reassured them.
It was a virtuoso sprint, over 30 yards, and a thumping, angled finish. It was his eighth goal for his country, in his 11th international.
That’s the sort of potency that makes Portugal’s coach, Fernando Santos feel less dependent on Ronaldo’s finishing.
“Andre is a very special striker with excellent movement inside and outside the penalty area," said Santos.
With Bernando Silva’s creative intelligence from attacking midfield, plus evidence, in the shape of Gelson Martins, of Sporting, that the country’s tradition for fine wingers continues, Santos has much to be happy about with next summer’s World Cup in mind.
He will keep his fingers crossed, though, that the young Portuguese players climbing up the ladder of club football will ease into their new jobs, in their new leagues. The transition is not always easy.
In the weeks after the Euro 2016 success, several of Portugal’s rising stars made big moves.
Joao Mario joined Inter Milan from Sporting after his impressive Euro 2016. Inter had a tortured season and the dynamic midfielder has missed the Russia expedition for his country with injury.
Andre Gomes is at the Confederations Cup, and to the relief of Fernando Santos, has played with reassuring elan after a season in which he suffered a great deal of criticism from supporters of Barcelona, who the 23-year-old joined last summer from Valencia.
Then there is Renato Sanches, the teenage sensation of last summer. The midfielder joined Bayern Munich from Benfica.
Having languished on the bench in Bavaria for much of the last year, he did not make the Portugal squad for Russia.
He has lately been back with the under-21s, watching from afar as his senior countrymen fare pretty well without him.
