What are you waiting for?

One, two, three, let the story begin: a Portuguese child who never saw their country in major tournaments. A child who viewed World Cups as distant lands, reserved for nations that appeared on trading cards. This child had to borrow heroes.

At Mexico 1986, they rooted for Maradona. How could they not? Maradona knew the secret passage of the game. A path uniquely his own. Later, in other World Cups, the child suffered with Baggio. For his elegance, his hair, his footballing Buddhism. And they also fell for Romário and his short-dribble samba, a single chord that sounded like a symphony. The heroes changed. The absence remained.

Between 1986 and 1996, an entire childhood passed without Portugal in a final phase. Today, when qualification seems like an acquired right, it's hard to explain what that meant. There was no indignation. There was resignation. The country didn't ask how far it could go. It asked when it would appear again.

Meanwhile, the child became a teenager. And started to believe. The Golden Generation brought a promise greater than mere results. Figo, Rui Costa, João Pinto. Portuguese names, great names. Admired by others. And how we, in our smallness disguised as arrogance, love to know what others think of who we are. If we have the best beach, the best restaurant, the best viewpoint, the best of everything and the worst of nothing. And there was our emotional boost.

It seemed Portugal no longer needed permission to enter. Perhaps it was possible to belong to the party of others. Perhaps heroes no longer had to be borrowed.

Euro 1996 opened the door. Euro 2000 changed everything. Portugal challenged. It seduced. It turned England inside out, it forced Zidane to feel human, condemning us to a sudden death that, in the end, was merely a rebirth.

There were painful defeats, but they were no longer the defeats of a team that had arrived by chance. They were the defeats of a team that had discovered it could look the giants in the eye and, at times, force them to lower theirs. The child who only wanted to see Portugal in a World Cup became the adult who gets annoyed when Portugal doesn't win it.

It's not ingratitude. It's the price of growth. Expectations also age. What seemed impossible at 10, seems insufficient at 44. Memory still knows where we came from, but the present no longer accepts living just to be grateful. Those who saw Portugal absent know the value of being there. Those who saw Portugal as champions, like in 2016, know the obligation to try and win.

This is where Jorge Jesus comes in. His first call-up isn't just a list of players. It presents a new possibility. And a possibility, in football, never comes alone. It brings the desires, illusions, and wounds of all who learned to measure time through their national team. Through its absences. And its presences.

What is asked of Jorge Jesus is too great. And why? Because it's not just football that's being asked. He's asked to reconcile two versions of the same country. The country that remembers not being there and the country that now only accepts being among the best. The country that was grateful for qualification and the country that considers elimination in the quarter-finals a failure.

We are the people of the Discoveries. We are also the people of Fado. Perhaps no image better explains this contradiction. We set sail because we believe. We sing because we distrust the ending. We have the courage to advance and a strange intimacy with defeat. When we win, we feel we've fulfilled a destiny. When we lose, we say we always knew.

Therefore, every national coach receives much more than a team. They receive an idea of Portugal. They have to organize a team and, at the same time, order centuries of euphoria and melancholy. They have to convince a people who too quickly swing from hope to fatalism. They have to explain that ambition isn't bravado and that prudence isn't fear.

Jorge Jesus arrives with the conviction of someone who has never been afraid to utter the word 'win'. Perhaps that frightens us because we recognize a part of ourselves in him. The part that believes talent should dictate, that the game can be dominated, that the future is conquered by moving forward. But there's another, older part, that stays behind, counting the ships that never returned.

At 44, that child now knows that football doesn't promise justice. They know that Maradona, Baggio, and Romário were also a way to fill an empty space. They know that having Portuguese heroes in the World Cup is no longer a miracle. And they know that this miracle, transformed into a habit, has forever altered the measure of our dreams.

That's why everything is now asked of Jorge Jesus. As it was of others before him. Not because Portugal has won many times, but because it spent too long not believing it could win. Not because history grants us that right, but because the present no longer allows us to escape that ambition.

Perhaps it's unfair. Perhaps it's excessive. But growing up is also this. It's being able to go back to the child who chose foreign heroes, sit beside them, and whisper: "Don't worry. The world will be ours too." Jorge Palma asked the question, "Portugal, Portugal, what are you waiting for?"

We are waiting for what we have always waited for. To tell that child that everything will be alright. No pressure, Jorge Jesus. No pressure. But with all the pressure, dreams, and despair of the child and the adult who doesn't want to see Portugal keep waiting.