Sporting CP 3 FC Porto 4 (Supertaça)

Sporting CP v FC Porto
Saturday August 3rd, 2024
Estádio Municipal de Averiro
Supertaça 

The warm up

For many Porto fans and indeed fans of Portuguese football in general they'll have never known a time where Jorge Nuno Pinto da Costa wasn't club president. After 42 years during which time he oversaw a record 69 titles, he lost the last round of elections to Andre Villas-Boas. A new era is dawning at the club and that has seen changes in the coaching staff. Sergio Conceição has left the building despite having signed a contract extension whilst Pinto da Costa was still president in his final days. Clearly neither was expecting for results to not go their way in the elections. Well as a famous man once said - Confidence is a preference for the habitual voyeur of what is known as … Parklife. Confidence however can clearly be misplaced. They will head into the Supertaça under the stewardship of new coach Vitor Bruno who had been assistant to Conceição and who ironically had left the club in May in his quest to become a first team coach. Porto it appears are living their own real life version of an episode of Mean Girls. Whilst it's all change at the top there have been no new arrivals in terms of playing staff as Porto’s financial woes continue off the pitch. Bruno’s appointment should mean continuity for the players at least but whether he can bring the same level of competitiveness from the current squad that Conceição did remains to be seen and the Clássico will be his first competitive game in full charge of the side having previously only fulfilled the role in the absence of the old coach through suspension. 

The two teams met in the last competitive game of the 23/24 season which saw Porto win 2-1 in the final of the Taça de Portugal after extra time with the winner coming through a Taremi penalty. He has since departed for Italy signing for the current Serie A Champions Internazionale. St Juste opened the scoring for Sporting before receiving his marching orders in the 29th minute and settling scores has been very much on the mind of Sporting players in the build up to this game. Speaking of the Dutch defender, he picked up another injury in the pre-season game against Sevilla and will be sidelined for at least another month. You begin to wonder if he'll ever gain a consistent degree of fitness following his move from Mainz having suffered a spate of injuries during his time with Sporting which have hindered his playing time. Also missing will be Nuno Santos who picked up an injury in the same game. Coach Ruben Amorim has announced that Gyökeres will start the game ahead of time. Speculation continues abound in England of possible suitors for the Swedish forward in the summer transfer window with the somewhat farcical notion that Sporting would accept less than the termination clause for his services. With PSR the new buzzwords in the Premier League, any club would have to be in a position to balance the books with the termination clause set at €100m and the fee due to be paid in one instalment. That's not going to happen without player sales with decent book value and that basically means selling your best academy prospects so you can purchase a player you didn't want to take a chance on last summer for one fifth of the price. Notably Arteta has also gone on record at Arsenal to say fans shouldn't expect any big signings. Levy at Spurs wouldn't greenlight that level of deal. Liverpool don't spend that level of investment on players. So I'm confident he stays this season but I'm frequently wrong about a lot of things so time will tell. It's also gone quiet on the Inácio rumour mill front. He spoke this week of his great pride in becoming part of the new captaincy team which again doesn't scream to me of a player desperate to leave anytime soon. I get the money is better in the Premier League but they're living in Lisboa; a beautiful city with a wonderful climate. They're playing as Champions and with Champions League football ahead of them. You can only spend so much money and I'd be fucked if I was to give that up to go live in the North of England with its shit weather and some bastard trying to rob your place when they know you're away playing Champions league football. You're attached to mainland Europe as well and on your day off you can nip over to Spain, play golf in the Algarve et al. If you want a pay day wait a few years and fuck off to Saudi Arabia with a fistful of title winners medals in your pocket. 

For anyone reading this not familiar with the Supertaça, it's the Portuguese equivalent of the Charity Shield except here it actually counts as a title win. Note again the word title. On the content trophy wins are all title wins. So whilst many have mocked José Mourinho in the past for saying the Charity Shield counts as a title when he's won it, he would have a point from the context of coming from Portuguese football. Arteta seemed to celebrate it like he'd won the Premier League last season for Arsenal so maybe it'll become more of a thing in England to, who knows. Am I desperate for Sporting to win tonight? Nah, it's just the Portuguese Charity Shield. I would however genuinely like Sporting to finish with 11 men on the pitch at the end of a Clássico and finally get wise to the tactics of Porto players playing more like toddlers and throwing themselves to the floor clutching their faces at the minimum of contact. Let's hope Bruno brings about a change in that mentality from his players. If you want to play act then fuck off to Hollywood and try your hand at actual acting. 

What would the headline be if Sporting won and the match was being reported in England? It would be a play on supercalifragilisticexpialidocious. I didn't have to look that up which is sad I know. So - Supertaça Lions were fantastic, Porto were atrocious. Maybe. Moreover on previous experience it's more likely that the referee was atrocious. Let's not tempt fate again. 

In the markets 

Sporting 6/5

Draw 9/4

Porto 9/4

I did look to see if I could find odds of a sending off for either side but could find none offered. 

Team News

Starting XI; Kovačević, Quaresma, Debast, Inácio, Quenda, Hjulmand, Morita, Geny, Trincão, Gyökeres and Gonçalves

Substitutes; Israel, Diomande, Muniz, Fresneda, Bragança, Fernandes, Esgaio, Edwards, Ribeiro

First half

How ironic in the week that Manchester City get fined £2.09m for delaying the kick off that the Supertaça fails to kick off on time. Porto finally get the first half underway. Sporting will attack left to right.

1 Corner to Porto with less than a minute on the clock. Headed clearance falls to Fernandes who blasts his shot wide of the right post

3 Namaso dispossessed Debast with Kovačević stranded. His shot from 30 yards just drops onto the top of the net. It's been all Porto in the opening minutes of this game. Couple of mistakes from Hjulmand and Debast as Sporting just managing to hold off the threat for now.

4 GOAL Sporting CP 1 Porto 0. Corner player short to Gonçalves whose subsequent cross into the box found Inácio who headed home from 8 yards. That's the first time Sporting have even been across the half way line in this game.

6 GOAL Sporting CP 2 Porto 0. This is like the last five minutes in the Dragão. Gyökeres picks up the ball five yards inside his own half. Drove deep into the Porto box and squared the ball back for Gonçalves whose shot deflected off a defender and past the near post of Costa. Porto fans must fucking hate Gyökeres with an absolute passion. When I wrote Sporting had not been across the halfway line until the opener they genuinely hadn't and in the space of three minutes they've scored twice. Welcome to club management Vitor Bruno.

13 Usual level of play acting from Galeno as Debast dispossessed him in the box. Man's a fucking embarrassment. I thought I'd got past his play acting for getting Edwards sent off but turns out that's triggered me again.

15 Could have been 3. Gyökeres heads over from 3 yards. Just couldn't get under the ball to direct his header down.

20 Gyökeres causing all sorts of mayhem in the Porto box again, holds it up well and finds Gonçalves who pulls it back for Hjulmand whose shot goes wide from 19 yards

21 Galeno curling effort from 17 yards comfortably saved by Kovačević

23 Great ball played into the corridor of uncertainty but no Sporting player in the six yard box to take advantage

23 GOAL Sporting CP 3 Porto 0. What a way to score your first senior goal. Gyökeres crosses from the goal line to an unmarked Quenda who cleverly volleys the ball into the ground from ten yards to clear the defender with the bounce and Costa to boot. Porto have a mountain to climb and you imagine this will surely be more about keeping the scoreline respectable.

27 GOAL Sporting CP 3 Porto 1. Howler from Debast as his attempted clearance slices off his outstretched foot into the path of Galeno who took it first time to knock it past Kovačević to make the scoreline a bit more respectable. That's clearly not what I meant when I'd just finished writing that above.

30 I'm not sure I've ever seen a game played in the Aveiro stadium but it's definitely designed to hold the sound in a bit like the Dragão and it's so far made for a cracking atmosphere unlike the concrete shit bowl finals are normally played at in Portugal.

35 Close up of Vitor Bruno on the touchline. He has the look of a man whose won a competition to be there.

36 Temporary respite for the players as flares thrown onto the pitch from the Sporting end.

38 Referee is just giving a thumbs up to both keepers that they can see the ball and the game is back underway as the smoke finally lifts

39 All the noise is coming from the Sporting fans. If you lived locally you'd be in no doubt whose set of fans was enjoying the game more

+1 Nico yellow carded for his follow through on Hjulmand

Plus four indicated

Half time

Sporting CP 3 Porto 1

Just as you shouldn't judge a book by its cover you shouldn't put your expectations of what the opening 45 minutes of a game will be like based on the opening 3 minutes. That Sporting go in at half time 3-1 owes much to one man, the scourge of Porto - Viktor Gyökeres. He may not have found the net but he's once more answered the question of what he likes on toast - the Porto defence. They've not been able to handle him this half and his link up play seems even better than last season which sounds frankly ridiculous even as I write it and you're now reading it.

It's not been the perfect half by any means. Sporting defensively have looked shaky at various points. Debast obviously had his error which led to the goal and another which could have given Porto an opener. These however are things which can be ironed out and matter little when you're 3-0 up in a game. When the scoreline is 0-0 however they will matter a great deal and Debast maybe needs to just build that better understanding with his fellow defenders and especially the midfielders in front and maybe be a little less ambitious with his passing range.

Having let Quenda off the reigns last week most of the action has come from Geny playing out of position on the left. Whether he plays the full 90 remains to be seen but if he does you imagine if they maintain the two goal advantage they may well switch tact in the second half and let him off the leash. It has to be said he's played his defensive part very well with only a couple of minor errors and his first goal is something he'll treasure for many years to come. He'll have to work on his goal scoring celebration. I'm not sure he quite knew what to do with himself as he turned and started to run. To be fair to the lad he looked like he was in tears though he may also have been poked in the eye by one of our substitutes.

Second half

Sporting get us back underway.

46 Bloody start for Gyökeres. I'm pretty sure you could see the blood squirting out his nose there onto the pitch as he gets an arm in the face. Delayed reaction from the Swede who had continued running before he went down. Pay attention Galeno. That's how you react when you've actually been hit and hurt.

48 Gyökeres goes down holding his knee in the box. The green and white half of Lisboa holds its breath. Not for a penalty, it's because it's his left knee he's coming back from surgery on. We cannot afford to lose him.

51 Sporting's defence are now holding a high line about a yard from the halfway line. In the opening five of the first half it was about five yards from the goal line.

53 Geny goes down in the box but the referee is unmoved.

54 Long raking pass finds Geny unmarked wide left. Clever ball into the centre found Gyökeres who rather inexplicably didn't hit it first time, instead he took a rather poor first touch which took him away from goal and the chance was lost when you'd have put your house on him to make it 4-1 from there. To be fair he's got something wedged up his hooter to stop the blood so that might be on his mind right now and he's human like the rest of us.

59 Sporting still look determined to add a fourth and equally shoot themselves in the foot at the back and offer Porto a way back in. I'm not convinced with Kovačević's passing despite how the Portuguese press seems to be raving about it but I frequently think I've been watching a different game to everyone else.

62 I'd be sending Diomande to warm up about now and just bring a bit of calmness and stability into the defence. I'm not fussed about whether it's Debast or Quaresma that comes off.

63 GOAL Sporting CP 3 Porto 2. That's why I'd have had Diomande warmed up and on because Sporting's defence and marking was non-existent there. Ball in from the right found Nico unmarked ten yards out and it was like his birthday, Christmas and Easter all rolled into one.

65 GOAL Sporting CP 3 Porto 3. Well as shit shows go that's certainly right up there as Galeno makes it two in two minutes and sweeps home from two yards. As I was saying about calmness and stability needed at the back. Now we know how Porto fans felt when Gyökeres did it to them in the Dragão.

66 Varela booked for a pull back on Quaresma

67 Unsurprisingly it's the Porto fans making all the noise now. Both sides are putting the Clássic into Clássico

71 Quaresma booked after Galeno with a blatant shirt pull on him. Presumably that's for dissent then and pointing out someone needs their fucking eyes tested. He had so much of his shirt at the back he could be a puppeteer in the Muppets

73 This pitch is looking like the fields up the road from where I live - very ploughed. I'd not want to be the ground staff at full time, they'll be at it with their pitchforks for hours.

76 Corner from the left by Gonçalves headed out only as far as Quenda who would have done well to repeat his technique from the first half but instead blasts it over from 15 yards. How things would have been different had Gyökeres swept home his chance first time rather than take that extra touch which would have made it 4-1.

78 Amorim still to bring anyone on and we've offered very little in an attacking sense this second half. Edwards on for Trincão? Bragança for Morita? We need something.

81 Sousa for Porto goes down like a sack of shit and Hjulmand knows it as he remonstrated with the referee. Different coach same old fucking shit.

82 ➡️⬅️ Oh finally Trincão replaced by Edwards.

85 Morita blocks a shot out for a corner. That looked goal bound on the replay

86 Shot on the turn and swivel palmed away with a fantastic save by Kovačević for another corner

87 GOAL Porto have the ball in the back of the net but clearly offside to the naked eye. Not sure why Bruno is waving his hands about having watched the replay on the bench it was clearly fucking offside. 36 cms so that's over a foot offside in old money.

88 ➡️⬅️ Bragança on for Morita. Oh look that's both substitutions I said should have happened ten minutes ago. I clearly need a hotline to the bench this season. I did to be fair also say Porto had a mountain to climb and they've climbed it and stuck a flag in my bubble and fair play to them.

Plus seven added

+1 Ball flicks up and hits the hand of a Porto player and out for a corner. Referee correctly waved Gyökeres appeal for a penalty away. Inácio header goes wide from the resulting corner and out for a goal kick.

+2 Gyökeres penalised for a foul and Amorim shown the yellow on the bench for his reaction.

+5 Quenda has gone down in the corner clutching his face. Sadly I think he's done a Galeno there.

Whistle blows with the scoreline Sporting CP 3 Porto 3

Fair play to Porto. They've been the better side by a country mile this second half and deserve to take the game into extra time. Will the fact Amorim has held onto his substitutions look like a tactical masterpiece with tired legs from both sides on the pitch? We'll see. Sporting's 3 goals seem a very long time ago now. As good as Porto have been they've been the beneficiary of some poor defending from Sporting be it the sliced clearance for the opener or the non existent marking for goals two and three.

Extra time First Half

➡️⬅️ No surprise to see Diomande enter the field. Only 37 minutes after I said he should have come on. Debast the player that makes way. It's not been the Belgians' night.

Porto get us underway and Sporting will attack from right to left.

91 Sousa takes out Quaresma. There won't be an inch given in this half if that's an early indicator.

92 Sporting using both wings as they attempt to create an opening

93 It's all Sporting so far. Quenda drives a ball into the six yard box, deflects goalwards and Costa saves at his near post.

94 Great defending from Diomande in the box. There's that calmness I was harking on about on the hour mark as Sporting pass their way out of trouble

95 Edwards tries to set Gyökeres free but the pass is intercepted and out for a corner

96 Handbags in the box. Diomande shown the yellow and I think Otavio for Porto

98 Eustaquio hacks down Edwards. Free kick in a dangerous position

98 Free kick comes to nothing

99 Fresneda stood on the sidelines with Fernandes ready to come on. Gonçalves and Inácio make way.

100 GOAL Sporting CP 3 Porto 4. Fuck me. I think that deflected off Fernandes as Jaime struck it from 20 yards and Kovačević lost the flight of the ball and it lobbed in over the keeper's head. Say it in French and it sounds more like Jammy which is what it was.

102 ➡️⬅️ Hjulmand off and Ribeiro on

104 Porto have literally had nothing in this opening 15 minutes and somehow it's they who lead this game. It's like the opening of the first half in reverse. Please let Edwards find an equaliser and run to Galeno to celebrate

105 Fernandes blasts over from 20 yards. There wasn't a Porto shirt within five yards of the youngster as the ball came to him there. He needed to control that and not hit it first time.

Half time

Sporting CP 3 Porto 4

Galeno is out on his back as he was when the clock had hit full time. I wish I knew Portuguese as Amorim gives his team talk in front of the cameras. I've been watching Shogun this week and they're supposed to be talking Portuguese and Japanese but I've understood every word of Portuguese mainly because it's all English. Lulled into a false sense of belief that finally after ten years I knew the language. I'm kidding.

Extra time Second half

Sporting do like a good late goal or two against Porto so let's see if lightning strikes twice. Porto were more than happy to sit back and defend in the first period of extra time and try to hit Sporting on the counter.

107 Sporting just conceding possession maybe to try open space at the back on the counter

111 Quenda unmarked on the edge of the six yard box fails to control his header. Maybe too much pace on the ball in fairness to the youngster. Porto's players are out on their feet.

113 Galeno the latest player to go down with cramp.

114 Sporting playing against ten men for now whilst Galeno receives treatment off the pitch

115 Nothing is coming off for Sporting despite clearly being the fitter side. Valiant defending from Porto

116 If they take this to penalties there won't be a Porto player with the strength in their legs to even take one

117 Bragança wasteful from 25 yards drives several feet wide of the right hand post. I think penalties is a fanciful notion.

118 Huge cheers as Fresneda miss controls the ball and kicks it straight out for a goal kick. That probably sums up Sporting's night.

Plus one shown

Full time

Sporting CP 3 Porto 4

The final word

Well as I wrote above both teams have put the Clássic into Clássico. Sporting will be scratching their heads for years to come wondering how exactly they've just lost that game from being 3-0 up and the truth is by shooting themselves in the foot not once but four times. Fair play to Porto for having the heart to come back but that wasn't from the brilliance of their players that was down to Sporting errors. I don't want to sound lemon but I think it's going to be a long season ahead for Porto. To be fair though if we keep defending like that it could also be a long season for us too. I'm not going to go into much detail because I've been writing for what seems like a fortnight and if you're still reading then thank you. Man of the match is tricky because no one really impressed in the second half and any quality in additional time from say an Edwards or Diomande didn't outweigh Gyökeres in the first half. Second half he had lumps taken out of him and spilled a lot of claret for the cause from his nose so the Swede gets it for me on his opening 45.