Jornada Three kicks off with action-packed Estoril 2-2 Rio Ave draw

A balmy evening as you’d expect in August on the Lisbon coast, a jovial crowd with a fair splattering of curious tourists and two middle-ranked Portuguese top-flight teams proved ingredients for an extremely entertaining evening at the Estádio António Coimbra da Mota tonight, as Estoril and Rio Ave played out an exciting 2-2 draw. 

At the end of the third round of Bwin Liga matches these two teams will be in the bottom half of the table. But on the evidence of this evening they both showed enough quality to suggest gambling on a top-half finish for both of them could pay dividends, just like visiting a highest payout online casino. Especially when you factor in that in one of their three matches both Rio Ave and Estoril faced extremely tough opposition in the shape of away fixtures at Sporting and Vitória Guimarães respectively. 

Free tickets

Rodrigo Martins gave Estoril an early lead against Rio Ave, but the visitors belied their terrible start to the season by largely dominating the next 70 minutes of the match and taking a deserved lead through goals by Costinha and Aziz Yakubu. Tiago Gouveia’s superb strike meant the points were shared at full time. 

For all the criticism Portuguese football gets for its often-disdainful treatment of fans, credit must be given where credit is due. I went to this match as a journalist accompanied by my son, and as we and dozens of others were waiting in line to buy the entry ticket we were given a pleasant surprise. An elderly Estoril employee appeared out of nowhere and bellowed: “you’ve come to watch Estoril. You don’t deserve to part with your money,” before proceeding to hand out free tickets to everybody in the queue. A good start.

Estoril made two changes to the team that were unlucky to lose to Vitória Guimarães last week, Tiago Santos replacing the suspended Gonçalo Esteves and Rodrigo Martins coming in for João Carlos. As for Rio Ave, despite two defeats on the spin, coach Luís Freire made just one change, Miguel Nóbrega coming in for Paulo Vítor as one of the three-man back line.

In the early exchanges Estoril looked the more confident team, Arthur testing Jhonatan in the first minute. The home fans were soon celebrating. A fine counter-attack saw Tiago Santos feed Arthur on the right flank, whose low cross left Rodrigo Martins with a simple finish from point-blank range. 1-0 Estoril.

The hosts continued to cause panic in the Rio Ave back line with long balls creating chances for Siliki and Rodrigo, but neither could convert, and the visitors gradually began to come back into the game.

Guga busy

The impressive Guga forced Dani Figueira into a diving stop and Rio Ave were looking dangerous from set pieces, but the half-time whistle went with Estoril preserving their lead.

In the second half Rio Ave’s ascendency accentuated, the northerners knocking the ball around confidently with Guga always at the heart of the action. When highly-rated right back Costinha headed in the equaliser on the hour mark it was no more than the away team deserved.

Rio Ave, cheered on by around 50 fans who had made the 400km trip, continued to pile on the pressure and took the lead in the 73rd minute with a brilliantly crafted goal. A series of swift passes in midfield created space for Joca to thread forward a killer through ball, with the rapid Aziz latching onto it and shooting firmly past Figueira into the net. 2-1 Rio Ave.

At that stage it looked for all the world that the Vilacondenses would be going home with the points, but Tiago Gouveia had other ideas. Francisco Geraldes seemed certain to score but could not beat Jhonatan from 10 yards out, but the ball rebounded to the Benfica loanee, who had such an impressive debut at the same venue a fortnight ago. Gouveia hit a sweet left-footer that curled into the back of the net and triggered an explosion of joy among the home fans.

Late drama

Suddenly Estoril were fired up, but it was Rio Ave that twice almost snatched the three points. First Paulo Vítor was upended in the box and although the referee showed him a yellow card for simulation, his subsequent call by VAR to review the incident on the pitch-side monitor suggested a penalty was imminent, but after watching the images Vítor Ferreira stuck to his original decision.

Soon afterwards Paulo Vítor was again speeding through on goal, this time with a clear sight of the net, but he powered his effort over the bar.

A horrible mistake by Aderllan, who gave the ball away cheaply to João Carlos in stoppage time, almost threw it all away for Rio Ave but Carlos could not get his shot off. There was still time for João Ferreira to be shown a straight red card for stamping on Bernardo Vital.

Soon after the referee blew his whistle for the final time to bring a lively encounter to a finish.

By Tom Kundert, at the Estádio António Coimbra da Mota

Goals:

[1-0] Rodrigo Martins, 6' 

[1-1] Costinha, 61'

[1-2] Aziz Yakubu, 73' 

[2-2] Tiago Gouveia, 81'