Portugal face a huge fight just to get out of the World Cup 2014, as they will be meeting opponents like Germany and the United States at this stage of the competition itself. This has been billed as the group of death in many quarters. Ghana are the other opponents in the group. There has been a danger of Portugal overlooking the African nation as a way of guaranteed three points, but former national team star, Pedro Pauleta disagrees. The former striker says that manager Paulo Bento should regard Ghana as a refugee threat to their qualification bid.

Ghana have been regarded as one of the best African teams in recent years. They may have failed to win the African cup of nations, but the presence of strong players makes them difficult to beat. Due to the presence of Real Madrid superstar Cristiano Ronaldo, the Portuguese are regarded as one of the favourites for the title. They came close to reaching the latter stages of the Euro 2012 largely because of Ronaldo’s skills. Since they open the World Cup against Germany, Portugal are looking at matches against Ghana and United States for three points.

Ghana have reached the knockout stages of the previous two world cups.

“Ghana is an interesting country which could spring a surprise, we have to give them the respect because of their past. We have to work on all countries very well because they all come to play us knowing a win against us could be historic. I have been lucky in enough to play against an African country for Portugal in Germany (Angola) and they were well organized a trait posed by all African teams,” said Pauleta.

Portugal come into the competition after having won the last four matches. They have pretournament friendlies against the likes of Greece and Mexico.