In a wide-ranging interview with Gregor Robertson in this morning’s Times, João Palhinha covers plenty of ground – just as he does on the pitch. He’s unsettled by the prospect of playing in stadia built by migrant workers who lost their lives but delighted to be picked for his first World Cup. Portugal could hardly leave him out, given how the tenacious midfielder has shone in the Premier League this season but the man with the octopus legs is pretty modest.

He says the fact that he leads the table of top tacklers in England’s top flight is important to him.

“It’s one of the things I like to know, because it’s one of my best characteristics. I’m always focused on this job. It’s one of the things the coach expects of me, so I try to do my best to recover the ball. I think this characteristic was born with me. Even when I was younger, I had more anger to recover the ball. Sometimes it’s more special for me to do a really good tackle in the first minutes than score a goal. Even more here, because the supporters in England like that … I just want to do my tackles and at the end of the season, hopefully I will still be top of the table.”

The Lisbon lad, who became a father to João Jr. earlier this season, is engaging on his unease at the workers’ rights situation in Qatar.

“For me, it doesn’t make sense. That the season will stop. The place we are playing. The weather. The human rights. Everything. The people with power need to speak about this. At the moment, nobody speaks. I don’t know why. But this is the same thing that happens in the world. This moment is about football, but this is about real life. Money, unfortunately, controls everything. It’s not good for the people, for the players, for everyone.

I’m not there, but I think it’s true. It’s going to be special because it is a World Cup. ut at the same time, we are going to be playing in a stadium some people died building. I think it’s not the perfect World Cup we have dreamt of. I don’t know if my team-mates share that opinion, but I think so.”