In this year’s Champions League, Portugal has more managers representing their homeland than any other European country. It’s some feat for a country whose league isn’t even usually classed as one of the top four leagues in Europe - despite the official UEFA ranking having it in fourth place.
It goes without saying that José Mourinho is the flag bearer of Portuguese managers. Having won it twice already with FC Porto and Inter he will be aiming to claim his third Champions League with his rejuvenated Chelsea side.
But the representation doesn’t stop there; André Villas Boas is now with Zenit St Petersburg, Paulo Sousa is with Basel and then there’s the likes of Jorge Jesus and Marco Silva for our very own Benfica and Sporting. Leonardo Jardim at Monaco completes the list.
The interesting question that many are posing is why are there so many Portuguse managers plying their trade at top European clubs? A lot of it is down to the fact that these budding managers or coaches are given a chance in their native league. Out of the 18 clubs in the Primiera Liga, 17 are managed by Portuguese coaches. Compare that stat to the Premier League in England where only a measly 9 out of 20 teams are managed by Englishmen. This has stunted the growth and opportunities afforded to English coaches, a possible explanation as to why they don’t have a single representative in this year’s Champions League, while Portugal has six.
Also, aside from current incumbent manager Roy Hodgson, the English national team have decided to employ foreign coaches over the last 10 years in the form of Fabio Capello and Sven Goran Eriksen, whereas Portugal just yesterday appointed another home nationality coach in Fernando Santos.
For fans of the Portuguese football, the desire to keep up to date with all your national representatives however far away should be a necessity. It can though be quite hard especially with the likes of AVB now working in Russia. But with the advent of many new and resourceful apps on the market, it isn’t as taxing as it once was.
In 2012, MobiThinking reported that there were approximately 1.2 billion app users globally. With Gaming Realms the company that launched gaming platform PocketFruity stating that “mobile Internet is one of the most powerful trends on the Internet landscape,” which has motivated many leading brands to go that extra mile to produce the most cutting-edge apps to launch on the market. And this goes for sports brands and news reporting too. You only have to look at the many Nike+ apps that have been a revelation to see that the sports app market is big business.
So, what does this mean to fans that want to track the news from their favourite Portuguese players and managers? Well, because of this influx of informative apps, there are many tools they will help you keep in touch with the coaches.
We have listed 3 of the best apps to keep track of their progress.
1. Official Chelsea – To keep up with the mercurial Mourinho, be sure to download the official Chelsea app to keep tabs on all the news regarding Mourinho’s second stint at the London club.
2. UEFA.com – For all the listings, rules and updates regarding the Champions League, this is UEFA’s official app.
3. One Football – There’s no better app to keep you update to date with a long list of teams. Make a note of the likes of Chelsea, Basel, Zenit, Benfica and Porto then push notifications up regarding goals, fixtures, breaking news and transfers.
