My Favourite Games: Deco

Deco is expected to return to the Portuguese line-up for their World Cup round of 16 game against Spain - but here we focus on the past rather than the future as the 32-year-old shares with us his two favourite games - one in which he played, and one he watched.

Favourite game played:

As one of just a few men to have reached the pinnacle of the club game, it is little surprise Deco picks a Champions League Final as his career highpoint.

Twice a winner of Europe's most prestigious club competition, the playmaker has triumphed at both Porto and Barcelona, while playing in more than 100 Uefa matches.

In 2006, he was part of the Barça side that came from behind to beat Arsenal in Paris, Juliano Belletti scoring a late winner, but it is his earlier success with Porto that brings the broadest grin.

Managed by Jose Mourinho, and with Paulo Ferreira, Ricardo Carvalho and Jose Bosingwa as team-mates (as well as former Chelsea loanee Maniche), Porto's was a close-knit side that had won the Uefa Cup after beating Celtic a year earlier.

n the Final in 2004, they could, and possibly should have met Chelsea, but instead it was our semi-final conquerors, Monaco, that they faced in Gelsenkirchen.

At first, Porto were up against it as their opponents started well, but when Carlos Alberto converted a Ferreira cross five minutes before half-time, the balance of the game changed.

Deco began to stand out, and netted his side's second goal with20 minutes to go, stroking home Dmitri Alenichev's pass to double the lead after a swift counter-attack.

Alenichev scored a third four minutes later and it was game over, the outsiders triumphant after coming past Manchester United, Lyon and Deportivo La Coruna en route to Germany.

'It was my first Champions League Final and it was different to win for Porto because everyone knows how difficult it is,' Deco says. 'All the teams want to win and Porto has less money than the other teams, but we had a great team, I scored in the Final and was Man of the Match.

'We had the same team that had won the Uefa Cup and we had a good spirit. Porto will find it difficult to have another team like that.'

Days later Mourinho departed for Stamford Bridge, bringing Carvalho and Ferreira with him, while Deco went on to spend four years in Spain before arriving in west London.

Favourite game watched:

Deco's cherished memory as a spectator brings back a family experience many youngsters will relate to, watching a game with your dad.

He would only have been knee high to a grasshopper at the time, but he still recalls the 1982 World Cup, when his native Brazil met eventual champions Italy in Barcelona. What followed would be one of the greatest games ever.

Brazil boasted one of its best ever sides too, with talent that could match the great 1970 team, names like Falcao, Socrates and Zico still so well remembered today. For Italy, there was Dino Zoff in goal, defender Claudio Gentile, Marco Tardelli (who would become so famous in the Final), and Paolo Rossi.

t was Rossi, who had been banned, that netted a hat-trick on the day to deny Brazil a semi-final spot despite great strikes from Socrates and Falcao.

'The favourite game I ever watched, I think it would maybe when Brazil lost against Italy in 1982, I don't remember much but I remember my father watching the game,' Deco recalls.

'Nobody thought Italy could win against Brazil, it was such a great team.

'It is my first football memory, I can't remember many things from then, but this game I can remember.'