Beto says that a desire to prove his detractors wrong is what pushes him to improve as a footballer.
The striker has been defying the doubters his entire career, from his lowly beginnings at Uniao Tires in Portugal’s fifth tier where he would work part-time at KFC to bring in cash to his big-money move to Everton last year, one that has yet to fully get going.
Beto struggled to impress last season after joining from Udinese in a £26m deal, starting just 10 games in all competitions and scoring four of his five goals coming off the bench, with his gangly and unpredictable style drawing skepticism from observers.
As he begins his first full season as an Everton player — he was signed shortly before the transfer deadline last August, three games into the campaign — he is determined to show that he has what it takes to be success in one of Europe’s toughest leagues.
“We need to understand one thing: football is simple,” Beto told BBC Sport. “We play football in our lives and [the supporters] are working like eight- or 12-hour shifts and they come.
“Not everybody in this life is going to love you and not everybody in this life is going to hate you. In this sports life, for me, it’s OK.
“Sometimes I like to read my comments when I played badly or missed chances. They will say ‘Beto is shit with missing chances’. But I like it because I say ‘OK, I will make this guy shut his mouth.’
“I take it personal too. When I’m in training the next week or the next day, I remember it and I say ‘No, this guy is not going to say this about me any more’ and I keep going.
“I need to have competition and I need to have people criticising me. I need to have haters. I need these kind of things in my life. Even when I was young it was always like this. When it is football, I take it really seriously.
“I have notes. I have screenshots from Facebook, YouTube — when they say something like I’m not good enough or something like that, I say ‘OK’. I take a screenshot, I put it on my notes and I read it.”