It was all too good to last. We might have guessed that a tournament which has throughout showcased the very best of the modern game would at some point have to reveal its ugliest, most unacceptable face, too. That the Portuguese, who had spent three weeks gracing Euro 2000, should be the ones who ended up disgracing it only made the occasion all the more depressing.

They bowed out of the event behaving like a cross between petulant five-year-olds and wild-eyed hoodlums; screaming, spitting and shoving, bullying the referee and his assistant in a manner which went beyond mere intimidation. One of them, Rui Jorge, feigned a head-butt on Slovak linesman Igor Sramka but they were all so out of control you feared he had come close to being the victim of the real thing.

All for what? Because Sramka had made a brave and, most likely, correct penalty decision against them. Yes, it was a hard call; yes, passions were high with seven minutes left of extra time and an historic first championship final appearance for Portugal still on the cards; and, yes, it was a cruel way to exit.

Yet none of that could possibly excuse their anarchic response both before and after Zinedine Zidane had converted the golden goal from the spot.

Almost all of Portugal's 22-strong squad, plus back-up staff, were involved in the mayhem and they would not stop even when one UEFA official was having to wrap himself around Sramka as a minder and push him towards the sanctuary of the dressing rooms past what seemed like a street-corner gang.

Austrian referee Guenter Benko sent off one player in the melee, Nuno Gomes, who had started by brilliantly by giving the Portuguese a 19th-minute lead against the run of play but who ended up taking the gloss off his excellent debut tournament by jostling Benko and chucking his shirt at him. Yet any number of them could have been red carded.

Abel Xavier, the Everton defender at the centre of the drama who had been adjudged to have hand-balled Sylvain Wiltord's strike from a narrow angle which may or may not have been goal bound, shoved Benko half a dozen times; Sergio Conceicao did likewise. Paulo Bento was seen spitting. None even got cautioned.

Humberto Coelho, the Portuguese coach, must go to the same optician as Arsene Wenger because he reckoned he had not seen a single push. Astonishing since, to his credit, he seemed the one Portuguese official making an attempt to keep the hordes off Sramka. Before announcing it was his last match in charge, he gave this pitiful defence of his team: 'They were tired and I think it was just a nervous reaction.'

UEFA cannot let the Portuguese get away with it. When they examine the videos, they should throw the book at them because, on this showpiece occasion beamed around the world, it was a nightmarish example to set to millions of watching kids.

There would have been a case for docking points from their next European Championship qualifying campaign. Unfortunately, though, they are the hosts. Doubtless, they will get off with a slap on the wrists.

Afterwards, they tried to camouflage their culpability by trotting out the old conspiracy theories about a little team being victims of a grand plot. 'There were people who said the final had been planned for France and the Netherlands. When you see something like this, you start to believe it,' said Rui Costa. Luis Figo muttered: 'We are a small country that many people didn't want to see in the final. UEFA must be very happy. But we've kept our dignity.'

He could not be serious, surely. Dignity? Figo, of all people, had shown none. How sad that the memory of his many splendid contributions to this tournament should be eclipsed by the image of him hurling his shirt on the floor and stomping off the pitch before the penalty was taken. Perhaps it was also down to frustration that he had been rendered largely impotent by the French midfield and outshone by Zidane.

Ultimately, for all their complaints - Xavier insisted it had not been a deliberate handball and defender Dimas echoed the team's feeling that Nicolas Anelka had been offside when he set up Thierry Henry's 51st-minute equaliser - the Portuguese could have none. France, without ever quite hitting their stride in a dogfight of a game, were superior in every department.

Portugal, while defending with massive commitment, could have pinched it when Xavier's header in the last minute of normal time was saved by Fabien Barthez and when Joao Pinto shot inches wide in extra time. Ultimately, though, they forfeited the right to sympathy.

When Dimas moaned about the linesman, saying he 'spoiled the match . . . and was bad for soccer,' he apparently did not recognise that it was he and his team-mates who had done the real disservice to the game.