I’m glad you could join me for the latest – and possibly last – chapter of my Sporting CP series on Football Manager 2020.
In case you missed Part 5, things have gone so badly over recent weeks that my job is now on the line as we head into the final two months of the season. We have seven games left to secure a top-three finish in the Primeira Liga (and a Champions League place) before finishing the campaign with the Taça de Portugal Final.
Failure is not an option. We must deliver.
SPORTING vs BOAVISTA (Primeira Liga – Match 28)
We went into April sitting five points adrift of 3rd-placed Benfica (with a game in hand), and signs of disharmony were beginning to show. Striker Andraz Sporar had decided that this was the perfect time to ask for a new contract, even though he’d scored only eight goals this season – and TWO since the start of the new year.
I stood my ground, telling Andraz to shut up and not ask me again until his form actually warranted a new deal. As you can probably tell, he didn’t appreciate that, complaining to the press and to his team-mates. Thankfully, the only guy who sided with him was 18-year-old winger Joelson Fernandes, but I had dropped Joel back to the Under-23s squad anyway due to poor form.
Another reason for concern was that our backup goalkeeper Renan Ribeiro had pulled an abdominal muscle in training, putting him out for a couple of weeks. That meant 20-year-old Hugo Cunha took his place on the bench when we hosted Boavista…
…and served up another load of rubbish. Just like in many of our recent matches, we racked up shots like nobody’s business, but most of them weren’t very good – and even the few half-decent chances we created were frittered away.
This time around, I held the midfielders to account more than the forwards. Out-of-form playmaker Reinier produced a disappearing act in the first half, so I made sure he didn’t reappear for the second. Unfortunately, things didn’t improve after I brought Pedro Mendes on to partner Luiz Phellype up front.
Eight minutes into the second half, a rare attack from Boavista ended with midfielder Gustavo Sauer blasting in a long-range shot that left me feeling very sour. Our enigmatic winger Luciano Vietto responded by finding the net in the 67th minute, but he was offside when Kévin Rodrigues crossed to him.
We didn’t seriously trouble the Panteras Negras again, not even after their on-loan Sporting midfielder Rodrigo Fernandes came off with a torn groin muscle. A fourth defeat in a row – and a third consecutive shut-out loss at home – left us even further behind Braga, Porto and Benfica.
SPORTING vs PORTIMONENSE (Primeira Liga – Match 29)
It was now imperative that we won our game in hand at home to rock-bottom Portimonense, who’d not recorded a single away win all season. In desperation, I switched to a 4-2-3-1 ‘gegenpress’ system, with Reinier given the chance to redeem himself in attacking midfield behind Luiz Phellype.
Well… we scored a goal, albeit only after another 20 or so attempts without success. Seriously, what has happened to this team? And why doesn’t the Luiz Phellype from the Europa League show up for our Primeira Liga games?
It wasn’t that Portimonense were particularly strong at the back or especially impressive on the counter. Indeed, it was only due to an error from our right-back Zeki Çelik that their winger Aylton Boa Morte (nephew of Luís) gave them a shock lead on the hour mark.
It took us pretty much the remaining half-hour to get back on terms. Captain Sebastián Coates headed in a Marcos Acuña free-kick at the far post to avoid another embarrassing result and salvage a point. The thing is, we needed all three.
And there’s why. Five points behind Benfica with five games to play was not a good position to be in. And if we lost our next game at Marítimo – on my 31st birthday, no less – we would suddenly be in real danger of slipping to FIFTH!
MARÍTIMO vs SPORTING (Primeira Liga – Match 30)
How about that for a birthday present? Another victory against last season’s bogey team, and a huge step towards securing a top-four finish!
Marítimo being Marítimo, though, this was always going to be a battle. Their low block made life very difficult for our attackers in the first half, with Sporar looking particularly poor on his first outing since that contract dispute. He and Cabral were both substituted at half-time.
Things got worse in the 65th minute, when Marítimo winger Nanu received a delivery from China (the left wing-back, not the country) and headed in the opener. Vietto retaliated with a vicious strike from Eray Cömert‘s direct ball four minutes later, but it looked like we would drop two more points…
…until 17-year-old Telmo Duque announced his arrival with an extraordinary winner deep into stoppage time. After receiving a clearance from Wendel on the halfway line, Telmo dribbled into the Marítimo box, then curled in a stunning shot from a difficult angle! What a way to score your first senior goal – and what a time too!
That late clincher kept us within five points of Benfica, who had made light work of Nacional da Madeira. Meanwhile, Porto missed the chance to go top, only drawing 1-1 at Vitória de Setúbal after leaders Braga had lost to our next opponents – Vitória de Guimarães.
SPORTING vs VITÓRIA DE GUIMARÃES (Primeira Liga – Match 31)
This dress rehearsal for the end-of-season Taça de Portugal Final went to the Sporting script, as we outclassed Vitória from start to finish. Midfielder Miguel Luís kicked it off by scoring just his second goal of the season after 13 minutes, slipping a shot home after a fine assist from Acuña.
Fresh from an impressive performance at Marítimo, Vietto enjoyed another from our right wing here. The Argentine was a constant attacking threat with his dribbling and crossing abilities, though he didn’t get on the scoresheet this time.
Vitória – and their goalkeeper Miguel Silva – did well to keep the scoreline down to 1-0 for a long time, but we eventually clinched victory in the 87th minute. Rodrigo Battaglia – a brilliant right-back deputy for the suspended Çelik – played a one-two with Vietto in the box and then squared the ball to Wendel, whose deft finish put the game to bed.
Porto assumed top spot after a comfortable win over Paços de Ferreira, with Braga dropping from 1st to 3rd following a late home defeat to Benfica. That meant we were now ‘only’ four points off the Champions League spots as we faced our toughest test of the run-in – at the home of the defending champions.
BENFICA vs SPORTING (Primeira Liga – Match 32)
We did much better than on our last visit to the Estádio da Luz, that’s for sure! For starters, we kept things tighter at the back, suffocating Benfica’s frontmen Odsonne Edouard and Carlos Vinicius of quality chances in the first period. Cömert was particularly resilient, especially considering he picked up a very early booking.
We gave our hosts a few scares through Cabral at half-time, and an early second-half counter-attack caused the Águias even more problems. Çelik intercepted a pass from Jhojan Julio and passed back to Cömert, who found Vietto open on the right wing. Luciano then used his pace to devastating effect, cutting through the backline before firing us into a 1-0 lead!
Bruno Lage’s side upped their game afterwards, constantly piling the pressure on our defence. Everyone in a Sporting jersey did their level best to keep our advantage intact, with even Wendel going back to make some important interceptions.
Sadly, there was to be no league double over our Lisbon rivals. When vice-captain João Palhinha mispaced a pass in injury time, Benfica winger Henrique Pereira pounced on it and crossed to our far post, where Edouard beat Cömert to nick a point.
If we had held on, we would have been within one victory of overtaking Benfica – and would still have had a mathematical chance of winning the title. As it was, we now needed maximum points from our final two games to have any chance of getting into the Champions League.
SPORTING vs VITÓRIA DE SETÚBAL (Primeira Liga – Match 33)
Our last home game of the season was against Vitória de Setúbal, who were still fighting relegation after a poor run of form that had seen them win just once in nine matches. You can probably guess where this is going, can’t you?
Yup. We found a new way to squander a home win against weaker opposition – by chucking an early 2-0 lead into the fire before half-time.
Petryak had got us off to the perfect start, converting a Miguel Luís through-ball after just three minutes. Miguel then followed his first league assist of the campaign with a second midway through the half – setting up Vietto’s third goal in four outings.
Then, without warning, we just switched off and allowed Vitória to play Barcelona-style tiki-taka against us. Naturally, they then turned into Burnley and pulled one goal back from a corner, which should have jolted us back to life. It didn’t.
Injury time was very painful for us. First, we lost Vietto to an ankle injury. Then, we lost the rest of our lead, as a 30-yard scorer from the visitors’ on-loan Benfica forward Chris Willock caught our otherwise impressive goalkeeper Luís Maximiano off guard.
That inexplicable collapse left us in no real state to fight back in the second half. Vietto’s injury had robbed us of any attacking ingenuity, while Mendes’ finishing bordered on the embarrassing. Indeed, Vitória looked the most likely team to score the game’s fifth goal, with only Maximiano stopping them from completing their incredible comeback.
And there it was – confirmation that Sporting finish 4th and won’t be in the Champions League next season. Looks like I’ll be packing my bags soon…
PAÇOS DE FERREIRA vs SPORTING (Primeira Liga – Match 34)
While Porto and Braga took their title battle to the final day, we had nothing to play for at mid-table Paços de Ferreira. I rested some of our first-team regulars and started a number of youth products, including Fernandes, Duque… and 18-year-old debutant striker Tiago Tomás.
The result was entirely predictable. Quaresma might have headed in his first Primeira Liga goal after just three minutes, but Paços then tore our young-ish team to shreds.
Guinea-Bissau winger João Mário equalised with a header in the 16th minute, while holding midfielder Mohamed Diaby hammered home a second goal from distance two minutes later. The rout continued after the break, with João Mário doubling his tally after Denílson had got his name on the scoreboard.
I brought three more youngsters on from the bench, with striker Danilo Luís and midfielder Tomás Silva making their PL debuts. Left-back Nuno Mendes got his second league outing in place of the awful Rodrigues, but an ankle injury saw him limp off late on, reducing us to 10 men.
And as if our league campaign couldn’t end on an even worse note, Coates gave away a penalty in the last minute of stoppage time. João Mário duly completed his hat-trick – and a humiliating 5-1 defeat for the Leões.
Porto choked on the final day, conceding an 86th-minute equaliser at Rio Ave to hand a first ever league title to Braga (who’d won 3-1 at relegated Portimonense). Rúben Amorim’s Arsenalistas became the first team from outside the ‘Big Three’ to be crowned Portuguese champions since Boavista did it in 2001.
After being left empty-handed for a second successive season, Porto gave their manager Marco Silva the chop. I would surely suffer the same fate at Sporting if we failed to deliver the Taça de Portugal a fortnight later.
VITÓRIA DE GUIMARÃES vs SPORTING (Taça de Portugal – Final)
The two-week wait gave the players plenty of time to sharpen up in training, while also boosting their confidence by playing in some reserve friendly games against non-league opposition. It also gave me plenty of time to reconsider my future at Sporting.
Come the big day, I’d reached a decision. If we won, I would withdraw my resignation and ask the president to keep me on. If we lost, I would resign immediately – at the end of my second season.
It wasn’t just my job that was at stake here. Victory would see Sporting back into the Europa League Group Stage next season, whereas defeat would relegate us to the Europa Conference League.
With no injuries or suspensions to worry about, I could name my strongest XI at the Estádio Nacional. My only real headache was over the left wing position, where I eventually plumped for Cabral over Petryak. Another big call was to start Miguel Luís in the playmaker role rather than Reinier, whose form had fallen off a cliff since March.
Vitória boss Pedro Martins had the unenviable task of picking up his team after a 6-0 home defeat to Famalicão in their final league game. He was also without left-back Mascarenhas through injury, though he still had some formidable players in winger Rochinha, playmaker André Almeida…
…and attacking midfielder Filip Krovinovic. In the third minute, the Croatian maestro chased after Pedro Henrique’s flick-on from Florent Hanin’s free-kick delivery into our box. Maximiano came out of his six-yard box to try and punch the ball clear, but Krovinovic got ahead of him to nod it into a gaping net.
The worst possible start for Sporting then got even worse just six minutes later. The last thing I wanted to see was a player lose his head, but that was exactly what Acuña did when he dived in on Rochinha with both feet. The referee could not bring out the red card quickly enough.
Less than nine minutes into the Cup Final, we were already a goal down AND a man down! I had to make a very early change, with Cabral coming off for Rodrigues, who was now our only real presence on the left flank.
Thankfully, we still had a substantial threat on the right in Vietto. His 15th-minute cross to Rodrigues led to a great headed chance that was well caught by Silva.
Vietto then went for goal himself in the 18th minute. The enigmatic Argentine got ahead of Pedro Henrique to drive in Çelik’s through-ball and level the scores!
Luciano was a man who thrived in the big games, and he was almost single-handedly spurring us forward. Five minutes after his equaliser, the Argentine wing wonder’s cross to the near post found Luiz Phellype, whose header ended his goal drought and moved him onto 17 for the season!
The 10 men of Sporting were now suddenly 2-1 up on Vitória’s full contingent! We just needed to be careful not to make too many sloppy mistakes, and we would head into the break in a surprisingly good position. However, that proved to be much easier said than done.
Following our left-back’s moment of madness early on, our right-back had one himself just before half-time. At first, Çelik had done well to dispossess Hanin on the edge of our box. Then he undid all that good work by failing to clear the ball to safely, as Krovinovic volleyed in his second goal from the edge of our box.
The game was still delicately poised at 2-2 after the first 45 minutes, but now the momentum had shifted to our opponents.
Vitória had assumed the favourites tag, and Maximiano needed to produce a good save to stop left-winger Davidson from half-volleying them into a 3-2 lead nine minutes after the restart. At the other end soon afterwards, Silva kept out headers from Coates and Miguel Luís.
Miguel was handling the big game, but his midfield Wendel was looking unusually apprehensive. After 65 minutes, I made the decision to take Wendel off and give Reinier the chance to change this game. Sadly, the teenage wonderkid had left his purple patch in the winter and was effectively frozen out by the Vimaranenses.
Shortly after Welthon struck the post for Vitória in the 75th minute, I made my final change – Çelik off, Battaglia on at right-back. (Rosier was actually fit for this game but didn’t even make my bench. Judging by the Frenchman’s recent injury record, I didn’t want to risk him picking up blisters in the first few seconds.)
Martins also made late changes to his team, bringing on ex-Manchester United right-back Saidy Janko as well as a young German midfielder. Elias Abouchabaka might have been hooked on a feeling, but he couldn’t hook a shot on target in the 82nd minute.
Vitória tried again as the match entered injury time. Rochinha shrugged off Rodrigues’ presence to whip in a late cross… and up popped Almeida to volley home the crucial goal on his 21st birthday. 3-2 to Vitória.
We had one chance to extend the drama and force extra-time, but Battaglia’s shot was easily saved by Silva. Moments later, Silva and his colleagues celebrated bring the Taça home to Guimarães… while we were left with just the silver medals.
We’d made too many stupid mistakes on the night, but one in particular left me really furious. I will NEVER forgive you, Marcos Acuña.
And with that, after two years in Lisbon, it’s all over.
So long, Sporting. I’ll miss you.
Okay… maybe not.
What an awful season that was – and it’s ended in yet another good ol’ Fuller FM collapse too. Obviously, I will need some time to digest and fully understand what’s just happened.
I’ll be back next week with the FINAL chapter of “The Sporting Life”, where I will summarise the 2020/2021 season and then try to answer the burning question: “Where did it all go wrong?”
Fuller FM 
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