Portuguese Football in English
Benfica kick off Portuguese participation in the 2015/16 Champions League group stage tomorrow as they host little known Astana in Lisbon.
PortuGOAL reached out to Manuel Veth, the Editor-in-Chief of the fascinating Futbolgrad, a football website that covers all the post-Soviet states.
Here is his detailed description of what the Portuguese champions can expect from the team that had to travel over 6200 kilometres from Kazakhstan to reach the Estádio da Luz.
One week before they face each other in the first Portuguese Clássico of the season both Benfica and FC Porto put in their most impressive performances of the new campaign.
Benfica crushed the previously unbeaten Belenenses 6-0 at the Estádio da Luz with striker Jonas celebrating his contract extension with an outstanding display. Porto followed suit with an excellent 3-1 away victory at high-flying Arouca, new signing Jesús Corona enjoying a dream debut by notching a brace.
Sporting are joint top after a hard-fought 2-1 victory at Rio Ave. Elsewhere it was a good weekend for the Madeira clubs, Marítimo and Nacional clocking up home wins and União picking up a useful point at Moreirense.
As has been the case most of the summer, it was FC Porto who hogged most of the headlines on the final day of the transfer window, boosting their squad with the acquisition of Mexican pair Jesús Corona and Miguel Layún.
Sporting and Benfica can also consider transfer deadline day a success, given that they managed to hold onto their top players – William Carvalho/André Carrillo and Nico Gaitán respectively – despite speculation throughout the close season that they would be sold.
After the early-season surprises, the top of the Liga NOS now has a more recognisable look to it, with the Big Three and Braga occupying four of the top five positions.
Braga were the team that impressed most in Week Three, thumping Boavista 4-0. Benfica left it late to take all three points against Moreirense in a five-goal thriller, while Porto and Sporting got the better of Estoril and Académica respectively.
The draw for this year's Champions League group stage was kind to Portugal's two representatives, with both Benfica and FC Porto handed groups that will leave them confident that progress to the knockout stage is possible.
Benfica were pitted against Atletico Madrid (Spain), Galatasary (Turkey) and Astana (Kazakhstan), while FC Porto face English champions Chelsea (and former Estádio do Dragão idols José Mourinho and Radamel Falcao), Dynamo Kiev (Ukraine) and Maccabi Tel Aviv (Israel).
Six opponents from six different countries make for a fascinating battle for the two Portuguese sides as they attempt to make it to the last 16 of the world's greatest club competition. Meanwhile, on Friday Sporting, Belenenses and Braga learned their group stage opponents in the Europa League.
