Portuguese Football in English
Benfica have fired up the buzz around preparations for the new season with a triple swoop for Tottenham Hotspur’s Jan Vertonghen, SC Freiburg striker Gian-Luca Waldschmidt and Grêmio star Everton Cebolinha.
The Eagles had been in negotiations with the trio for a number of weeks and they now headline a list of signings under Jorge Jesus that totals six new faces, following the buys of Pedrinho, Gilberto and Helton Leite.
Good news for fans of Portuguese football residing in the UK and Ireland! LiveScore has announced expanded rights for its 2020/21 Free-To-Air Football Service, including an average of three matches every round of Portugal’s Primeira Liga.
After achieving half a million viewers since June, the popular mobile phone app has confirmed the leagues available for live streaming next season: Primeira Liga, Serie A, Eredivisie and the Chinese Super League alongside a host of global competitions.
Tondela pulled off a final day relegation escape act to maintain their top flight status for another season. It’s becoming something of a custom for the Viseu-based side, saving their salvation right to the very end for the fourth time in the last five seasons in Portugal.
What follows is the story of how the Primeira Liga’s very own Houdini act repeated the trick time and time again.
SL Benfica 1-2 FC Porto
FC Porto have completed the league and cup double after defeating Benfica 2-1 in the Taça de Portugal final in Coimbra, this Saturday, despite a first-half Luís Diaz red card.
The Dragons were forced to face the Eagles with just ten men after Diaz’s dismissal, in addition to Sérgio Conceição’s sending off, leaving Porto with a tall order going into the break, still locked at 0-0.
An early second-half double from Chancel Mbemba turned the tide for the Blue & Whites, however, standing strong in the face of a late Carlos Vinícius penalty to secure the club's first Taça de Portugal trophy since 2011 with a 2-1 win.
Another Liga NOS season in the bag also means the closure of the PortuGOAL Figure of the Week feature for another campaign.
For the duration of the 2019/20 campaign the vast majority of clubs were represented across the season, as is the intention, only Boavista failing to get a piece on their player/manager.
Some interesting patterns emerged on reflection of the year as a whole, such as Famalicão and Benfica being heavily featured in the first weeks of the season before drying up later on, as the teams’ respective form followed suit.
Perhaps aptly league champions Porto were represented the most with four articles, although conversely despite struggling throughout the season on and off the pitch Belenenses found themselves represented on three occasions due to fine individual displays.
Links to all the pieces are available below, as is the option to read about represented figures from both 2017/18 and 2018/19.
Enjoy, and see you in September.
