Portugal manager Humberto Coelho arrives at this evening's Euro 2000 semi-final tie against France in the King Baudouin stadium in Brussels with one of two pre-championship fears safely laid to rest.

Clean sheets in their last three games against Romania, Germany and Turkey were an effective riposte to those who reckoned that the footballing poets of Europe lacked the stability at the back to win their first major title.

On their ability to solve the other perceived problem, a lack of a real cutting edge in the striker department, may now depend their prospects of ending the most celebrated era in French football.

As an old central defender, Coelho insists that he had never had much doubt about the ability of players like Fernando Couto and Jorge Costa to do the business in the challenge of matching poise with power.

The reality is, however, that in spite of hitting the target eight times on their way to the semi-finals, they have not yet convinced their critics that they are capable of winning the championship without a big hitting striker.

"It's true that we don't have the kind of centre forward available to the Dutch, Italians or French," said Coelho. "But we've been aware of this for some time and have made our plans to compensate for it.

"As we proved in our earlier games we are capable of scoring from different parts of the pitch. And I believe this makes it more difficult for our opponents."

The point is well made. At a time when the changed and changing rules of the game are inducing some marvellous individual performances, nobody has exploited the freedom bestowed by vigilant referees more profitably than players like Luis Figo, Rui Costa, Nuno Gomes and the three goal hero of the win over Germany, Sergio Conceicao.

There were those who feared that a long, difficult season at Barcelona would reduce Figo's impact here. The reverse has been the case with Figo, superb in short, sharp bursts, pressing his claims to a place among the best in the tournament.

Among those who turned up at yesterday's press conference was the peerless Eusebio, and the man who gave Portuguese football a new rating in the 1960s had no doubts about Figo's growing authority. "He gets better all the time and I think he can go on to be Portugal's best ever player," he said.

So far, Rui Costa hasn't produced the kind of finishing skills which brought him six goals in the qualifying rounds. Yet in the pantheon of playmakers his superb skills on the ball and his ability to make the perceptive pass earn him a special place.

At a time when the established pecking order in Europe showed few signs of change, Portugal's development as a major power after going out at the quarter-final stage in the 1996 championship in England has been a breath of fresh air.

This is the team which evolved from the players who won the world youth championship in consecutive seasons at the start of the 1990s. And Rui Costa considers that the sense of togetherness, refined with the years, is now among their greatest strengths.

"We've grown together as a team and now I think we are at a peak," he said. "People know immediately when and where to run in situations in which we have the ball and that has been important in all our games in this competition."

Whether that impressive rate of improvement has reached the point where they can now topple the world champions is, however, still open to question. After their fluent progress on home terrain two years ago, France have invariably been more efficient than effervescent since opening their title bid.

Significantly, they were closer to their best in last Sunday's performance against a revitalised Spanish team, taking their goals with aplomb and defending with discipline. Undeniably, however, the pressures of kingship have taken their toll. "Before the World Cup we were just another team making our way to the top," said manager Roger Lemerre. "Now everybody wants to beat France because it makes big news and that means that all our games are hard."

As yet, however, Lemerre is not prepared to reveal the team he will send out. Against Spain, he was forced to start without the injured Emmanuel Petit and then had his problems exacerbated when Christophe Dugarry damaged his nose.

Petit's influence on the French success story has been enormous. To that extent, the manager will be loath to go without him in what promises to be their most demanding examination since taking Brazil apart in the World Cup final in Paris.

To gamble on his fitness, however, would be to sacrifice the rounded talents of Patrick Vieira. And in the light of Vieira's display last Sunday, when he ran Zinedine Zidane close for the man of the match award, that would be a controversial decision.

Art and ambition suggest that Portugal, under achievers for so long, can take their captivating challenge a stage further. French pragmatism and their proven ability to lift their performance on the big occasion points to a different result at the end of another evening to savour.