Year after year, the Portuguese league is often contested fiercely by three main competitors from the two main cities of Portugal; Lisbon and Porto. In fact, there has never been a team outside of these two cities that has ever gone on to win the league, and outside of Benfica, Porto and Sporting, only two other teams have ever hoisted the league trophy. (Those two being Belenenses of Lisbon and Boavista of Porto in 1946 and 2001 respectively)
This year, it seems, could finally see an end to the pattern. Following wins against Sporting, Porto and Benfica, Sporting Clube de Braga have found themselves top of the league on 25 points. Benfica also have 25 points, but as a result of Braga’s emphatic 2-0 win at home over Benfica a few weeks ago, and due to the head-to-head result being the tie-breaker, Braga are technically flying solo at the top of the mountain.
Surely there are many who expect that Braga will soon slump and find themselves content to win a spot in Europe, but given their impressive form, this seems an unlikely scenario. Braga are hardly the first team to have made an uproar in the beginning stages of the season. Previous seasons have seen other teams fight for the top spot for about six to eight weeks before finally settling into mid-table mediocrity. However, we’re now going into the 11th round of matches and Braga do not seem to be stuttering.
It would be foolish to say that this is a one-time thing for Braga. Followers of the league know fully well the drastic improvements that Braga have made in the last five years, arguably forcing the issue on whether there were three of four top teams in Portugal.
Despite that, it still comes as a massive shock that Braga have made such an indentation on the foundations of Portuguese football, especially considering their transfer deals in the off-season, which included the exits of talented striker Roland Linz, former-captain Paulo Jorge, Luis Aguiar, Stelvio, and Orlando Sá. Their incoming transfers were hardly seen as suitable replacements. Newcastle United reject Hugo Viana joined the squad on loan from Valencia, in addition to the loan signing of Rodridgo Possebon from Manchester United, former Porto and Nacional hit-man Adriano and the free-transfer of a dynamic winger with the name of Diogo Valente. Of those four, only Hugo Viana has played any major role in Braga’s efforts this season, an effort which includes on Viana’s part, a spectacular wide-angled free kick goal against Benfica.
Despite this, it is unquestionable that Braga do indeed have a talented roster which includes the current Portuguese national team goalkeeper Eduardo, pacy winger/forward Alan, prolific goal-machine Meyong, and Vandinho.
It will truly be interesting to see how Sporting Clube de Braga cope in the rest of the season, especially since their coach, Domingos Paciência, has no experience managing a title-contending club. For this reason, many questions pop up. How will he handle the pressure? How will he keep his team focused on winning?
By the end of the season, however, these questions will be more than answered in colorful detail, and one can only hope that Braga do indeed break the vicious cycle of the ‘big three’ in Portugal.
Paulo Pincaro is an up and coming football analyst who previously wrote for the LusoAmericano newspaper based in Newark, New Jersey and can be contacted via email at PauloNewYorker@yahoo.com
Written By Paulo
Pincaro
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Good article. I agree that Braga has a very solid team, from the D to the midfield and the forwards this squad is loaded with talent that includes a very experienced and well balanced bench (something that was lacking for them in the past). They play well as a team, they are very disciplined tactically and don’t make many mistakes. Joao Pereira is playing like a top 3 right-defenseman in Portugal and was perhaps Braga’s most consistent player last year. One thing that might play to their advantage is the fact that they are no longer in any European competition, which means less games to play than the BIG 3 and in turn minimizes the risk of injuries of key players. That perhaps will help them stay in contention for a long time.