Earlier this 12 months, at a FIFA awards ceremony held in London, Bernardo Silva was ranked because the eighth finest males’s participant of 2023, voted for by gamers, coaches and journalists from around the globe. Lionel Messi edged out Erling Haaland for the highest prize.
Silva is respectful when the topic comes up. “Recognition is always nice,” he tells Sky Sports activities. However one senses, beneath the floor, there’s a wholesome disregard for these particular person awards and their place within the sport. It quickly involves the fore.
“In my opinion, I give the right amount of importance to these awards,” he continues. “Because, at the end of the day, we are playing a collective sport. Nowadays, the individual awards always go to the strikers because they have that last touch.
“However should you perceive the sport, an individual who’s inside the sport, both a participant or a supervisor, you understand how vital it’s to have a correct goalkeeper, a correct defender, a correct midfielder and a correct striker. Not only a correct striker.
“Strikers do not win you titles alone. The base comes from defence. If you defend well, you will attack better. When I look at individual awards and I see that only the guys who score goals win the awards I feel a bit like it does not represent our sport that well.”
Tellingly, his Portugal team-mate Pepe and his nationwide crew boss Roberto Martinez did forged a vote for Silva. “When the people around you on a daily basis trust you, count on you, and think you can help them win things, that is a big motivation to keep going.”
Briefly, he’s a crew participant in a crew sport. “I always do my best to support my team-mates and do what is best for the team,” he provides. “In the end, winning the Champions League is much better than winning a Ballon d’Or. I would not swap it. No chance.”
Euro 2024 is his subsequent goal. Silva remembers the whole lot about Portugal’s Euro 2016 triumph. He ought to have been on the coronary heart of it. As a substitute, he was watching on, damage having robbed him of his half in his nation’s first main match success.
It will need to have been an odd feeling? “It was a mix of emotions. I was so frustrated before the competition for not going because I wanted to be a part of it. I did all the qualifying. It would have been my first big tournament and I would have been there but I got injured.
“However then, ultimately, once they gained it, I’m Portuguese. Everybody was so blissful, all my household, all my buddies, everybody. So it was a mixture of frustration for not being there but in addition being very blissful as a result of it was our first large title as a rustic.”
Eight years on, Silva will turn 30 in August. The intervening period has brought glory. Six times now he has lifted the Premier League trophy with Manchester City. Last year, he was able to add the Champions League to his impressive list of honours.
Now he is ready for another tilt at the trophy that eluded him.
“The humorous factor about enjoying to your nation is that even my grandmother who doesn’t care about soccer, when Portugal play, she loves to observe it. When a rustic performs, all people watches. Even those that don’t like that particular sport.”
Does he feel that pressure? “Whenever you play in a Euros, undoubtedly,” he says. “You might be representing your complete nation, your loved ones and buddies. We’re all human. You’re going to really feel it extra. Enjoying for Portugal is all the time a bit totally different and particular.”
Silva is speaking at an adidas photo shoot, the theme of which is pressure and coping with it. He freely admits that football can be relentless. That demand to win is a constant companion as a Manchester City player and he feels it on the rare occasions they fall short.
“If you happen to love the sport, you wish to do it properly. And if you wish to do one thing properly, you are feeling that accountability. That’s the reason you are feeling stress. In a manner, that stress is an efficient factor. It’s your thoughts and your physique telling you that you really want this.
“It is up to you to try to control these emotions.”
When stepping as much as take a penalty towards Actual Madrid within the quarter-final of the Champions League in April, Silva saved calm and opted to go down the center. The goalkeeper Andriy Lunin stood nonetheless, saving the shot. Metropolis misplaced the shootout, relinquishing their crown.
He quickly rationalised his determination as a proportion play. In these large moments, goalkeepers are nervous too. They have a tendency to dive. On this event, it didn’t work out. “It is not all beautiful and nice. Sometimes you go through bad moments,” he says.
“I am not going to say I do not feel nervous. But I try to accept it. It is a reality of the job. It is part of it. The challenge is to deal with those difficult moments. Accept it. It is about accepting it and continuing to work. If you do that, you will do better next time.”
Perspective is vital for Silva. “It is a game. You are not going to die if you lose.” He talks of the necessity to “play with a smile on your face” and attempt to preserve maintain of this thought within the low moments. And there’s all the time household life to assist him to recollect.
“Going home, it does not matter if I win, lose or draw, seeing my daughter is something that I always look forward to,” he says. “Life with my daughter, my wife and our two dogs, whatever happens, knowing we will be a good family, it keeps me going.”
It’s the kind of level-headed method that has helped make him such a well-liked determine for membership and nation. Silva just isn’t flash, on the sphere or off it. “He does not have any tattoos or a nice car,” says Pep Guardiola. He’s simply among the finest gamers on the planet.
Bernardo Silva had the best anticipated assists from open play of any Man Metropolis participant
Silva is the one who knits the play, the one who makes the off-the-ball runs, fills in the place he’s wanted. Throughout a season through which, once more, others took the plaudits, he created essentially the most possibilities from open play for Metropolis as they retained the Premier League title.
There’s a sense that he stays at his happiest out of the highlight, as if that is his pure habitat, regardless of his extraordinary items. However typically that’s unattainable, comparable to when he was the participant of the match in Portugal’s 2019 Nations League success.
That didn’t change him as an individual however maybe it did change how different folks behave round him – and his prolonged household again residence in Portugal. “The more I win, the more people are speaking to them, children asking for a video or asking for my shirt.”
A part of the joys of watching Silva is that his personal childlike exuberance stays a part of him. “On the street, in school with friends, or in Benfica’s academy, I remember just enjoying having the ball around me. Doing what I love, which is playing football. Pure joy.”
Has that modified? “It feels a bit more like a job,” he confesses. However there’s a caveat. “And I still love my job. It is a dream come true.” And there are not any plans for it to finish any time quickly. “No chance. I am going to play as much as I can. When I cannot, I will stop.”
Earlier than that, there is a chance to assert that overdue European Championship with Portugal. The squad is powerful and Martinez has made begin. “We are enjoying the time with him. The results have been really good. But now the big challenge comes.”
And if the stress is on, and it required a penalty shootout for Portugal to progress, even perhaps win it? “I would take it. Hopefully, I would score. But I would take it, knowing that it is a big responsibility. I would take it, definitely.” Regardless of the crew wants.
