Portuguese football season 2023-24

[rpo.castro]

Another round, another defeat for Porto (5 for championship), again against Estoril. This season, 4 matches, 3 vitories for Estoril (2 for the league, 1 for league cup), only 1 for Porto (portuguese cup).

1. Sporting 68/26
2. Benfica 67/27
3. Porto 58/27
4. Braga 56/27
5. Guimarães 53/27

Tonight, for the Portuguese cup SF 2nd leg, at 21h45 CET Benfica-Sporting (1-2 in 1st leg).
Porto will play at Guimarães tomorrow but the 1st leg yet.

[rpo.castro]

Sporting in portuguese cup final after 2-2 draw at benfica (2-1 victory in 1st leg).
They will meet again next saturday for the league at Sporting ground.

[rpo.castro]

Great week for Sporting.
They just beat benfica by 2-1 (only victories at home) and now they are cruising for the championship.

Braga got heavy beaten by their future coach (Arouca) by 0-3, won't take any benefits from Porto-Guimaraes match tommorrow and looking at schedule and the performance of team, looks like they are going to fail EL qualification.


1. Sporting 71/27
2. Benfica 67/28
3. Porto 58/27
4. Braga 56/28
5. Guimarães 53/27

[mspm89]

Braga's possible overtaking by Vitoria Guimarães would be weird enough without the thought of them overtaking Porto as well! If Portugal was still 6th, it could've been the weirdest CL qualifying club since that flukey Paços de Ferreira about a decade ago.

[rpo.castro]

Portuguese league lost a lot of quality.
Benfica despite terrible football in first half of season keep winning. FC Porto is just sht. Only played good in CL, in the league they lose against everyone.
Braga had a decent team, but weak defence and no coach. Guimarães has lack of quality in squad but they are more a team. Despite their 4th coach and bad football they are managing to score a lot of points, like Braga did past season because other teams are even more terrible. Most teams are in the battle for 16th position, the play off spot.
There i no team that could aim for Europe besides the top 5.
And we can see it clearly in European matches. Portugal was overperforming for quite long time. Too much time

[xavier_]

Portuguese league lost a lot of quality.
Benfica despite terrible football in first half of season keep winning. FC Porto is just sht. Only played good in CL, in the league they lose against everyone.
Braga had a decent team, but weak defence and no coach. Guimarães has lack of quality in squad but they are more a team. Despite their 4th coach and bad football they are managing to score a lot of points, like Braga did past season because other teams are even more terrible. Most teams are in the battle for 16th position, the play off spot.
There i no team that could aim for Europe besides the top 5.
And we can see it clearly in European matches. Portugal was overperforming for quite long time. Too much time

Quem com ferro mata, ferro morre- As they say, this is a mere result of missing multiple chances to make a more equal league by having a fairer and balanced profits distribution, more particularly the TV rights, that old topic. It has been a very another uninteresting season, despise the brilliance of Gyökeres. Reducing the number of teams makes more sense, and perhaps following the Belgium model where the top4/top6 fights for the title.
Overall the Portuguese competitions model feels very dated and to be honest quite boring, even has a Portuguese fan. The league certainly does not have the quality, and the focus should be in having middle of the table competitive teams. That does not exist, in terms of consistency, even when a new comer appears it quickly fades to a relegation (See Pacos Ferreira, Santa Clara, Estoril, Moreirense and Arouca a few years ago).

Guimarães in EL Q could actually be a good thing, because when they inevitably embarrass themselves with losing a favorable draw at least they would have a net of the ECL. And Braga or Porto in the ECL could be quite a point farm for the overall country coefficient.

[rpo.castro]

Portuguese league lost a lot of quality.
Benfica despite terrible football in first half of season keep winning. FC Porto is just sht. Only played good in CL, in the league they lose against everyone.
Braga had a decent team, but weak defence and no coach. Guimarães has lack of quality in squad but they are more a team. Despite their 4th coach and bad football they are managing to score a lot of points, like Braga did past season because other teams are even more terrible. Most teams are in the battle for 16th position, the play off spot.
There i no team that could aim for Europe besides the top 5.
And we can see it clearly in European matches. Portugal was overperforming for quite long time. Too much time

Quem com ferro mata, ferro morre- As they say, this is a mere result of missing multiple chances to make a more equal league by having a fairer and balanced profits distribution, more particularly the TV rights, that old topic. It has been a very another uninteresting season, despise the brilliance of Gyökeres. Reducing the number of teams makes more sense, and perhaps following the Belgium model where the top4/top6 fights for the title.
Overall the Portuguese competitions model feels very dated and to be honest quite boring, even has a Portuguese fan. The league certainly does not have the quality, and the focus should be in having middle of the table competitive teams. That does not exist, in terms of consistency, even when a new comer appears it quickly fades to a relegation (See Pacos Ferreira, Santa Clara, Estoril, Moreirense and Arouca a few years ago).

Guimarães in EL Q could actually be a good thing, because when they inevitably embarrass themselves with losing a favorable draw at least they would have a net of the ECL. And Braga or Porto in the ECL could be quite a point farm for the overall country coefficient.

I agree.
Its madness such big league for such tiny country/market with so low income. Yes big 3 make a lot on transfers and plus they have all the sponsors, and alll tv rights and UEFA money. What does that leave to rest teams?
And if you don't have real internal competition you won't be competitive long term. Being good or bad big 3 win their matches. You need to be very bad to lose some matches, like porto currently.

Where are the medium size teams that were always hard?
Boavista? Went to 3rd level and got up only by court decision.
Maritimo in II liga
Nacional II liga
Rio Ave was almost bankrupt
Belenenses gone
Guimarães, best season ever, and still their combined results against top 3 are weak. Even Braga results against top 3 only got more positive with Carvalhal.
Very unbalanced, level by low.
10 or 12 teams maximum, we can't have more than that. Then teams getting divided into championship group and relegation group is needed.

On sport level, Porto did lose.

Porto 56
Braga 58
Guimarães 58

Braga will face both in the 2 last matches. Could be interesting the fight for EL. But Braga might be dead before that. Antonio the Builder wanted to save 1M€...

[rpo.castro]

Sporting won 4-0 yesterday
Porto got a draw in last minutes, at home against Famalicão 2-2. When there is lack of money and the bribes to referees are over they don't get free penalties, no gift victories.
Guimarães got a draw too.

[ngfsmg]

Portuguese league lost a lot of quality.
Benfica despite terrible football in first half of season keep winning. FC Porto is just sht. Only played good in CL, in the league they lose against everyone.
Braga had a decent team, but weak defence and no coach. Guimarães has lack of quality in squad but they are more a team. Despite their 4th coach and bad football they are managing to score a lot of points, like Braga did past season because other teams are even more terrible. Most teams are in the battle for 16th position, the play off spot.
There i no team that could aim for Europe besides the top 5.
And we can see it clearly in European matches. Portugal was overperforming for quite long time. Too much time

Quem com ferro mata, ferro morre- As they say, this is a mere result of missing multiple chances to make a more equal league by having a fairer and balanced profits distribution, more particularly the TV rights, that old topic. It has been a very another uninteresting season, despise the brilliance of Gyökeres. Reducing the number of teams makes more sense, and perhaps following the Belgium model where the top4/top6 fights for the title.
Overall the Portuguese competitions model feels very dated and to be honest quite boring, even has a Portuguese fan. The league certainly does not have the quality, and the focus should be in having middle of the table competitive teams. That does not exist, in terms of consistency, even when a new comer appears it quickly fades to a relegation (See Pacos Ferreira, Santa Clara, Estoril, Moreirense and Arouca a few years ago).

Guimarães in EL Q could actually be a good thing, because when they inevitably embarrass themselves with losing a favorable draw at least they would have a net of the ECL. And Braga or Porto in the ECL could be quite a point farm for the overall country coefficient.

I agree.
Its madness such big league for such tiny country/market with so low income. Yes big 3 make a lot on transfers and plus they have all the sponsors, and alll tv rights and UEFA money. What does that leave to rest teams?
And if you don't have real internal competition you won't be competitive long term. Being good or bad big 3 win their matches. You need to be very bad to lose some matches, like porto currently.

Where are the medium size teams that were always hard?
Boavista? Went to 3rd level and got up only by court decision.
Maritimo in II liga
Nacional II liga
Rio Ave was almost bankrupt
Belenenses gone
Guimarães, best season ever, and still their combined results against top 3 are weak. Even Braga results against top 3 only got more positive with Carvalhal.
Very unbalanced, level by low.
10 or 12 teams maximum, we can't have more than that. Then teams getting divided into championship group and relegation group is needed.

I'd say even more, what about a championship with only 4 teams? That would be way cooler!
Being serious, saying this in a year where the goal average has been way higher than previous years and where there are mid teams like Arouca and Famalicão - I mean, if the top-4 is demolishing everyone, it's because the league is weak, but if Porto and Braga are losing points against a lot of smaller teams it's because the league is weak too? Also I hate play-off systems, we have them here in the lower leagues and they're very unfair, a team can be in first plae by 20 points and then loses 2 or 3 games and they're out, it goes completely the logic of a league which is consistency, for one-game wonders we already have the cup

[rpo.castro]

1. Sporting 74pts/28matches
2. Benfica 67/28
3. Porto 59/29
4. Braga 59/29
5. Guimarães 57/29

[rpo.castro]

Quem com ferro mata, ferro morre- As they say, this is a mere result of missing multiple chances to make a more equal league by having a fairer and balanced profits distribution, more particularly the TV rights, that old topic. It has been a very another uninteresting season, despise the brilliance of Gyökeres. Reducing the number of teams makes more sense, and perhaps following the Belgium model where the top4/top6 fights for the title.
Overall the Portuguese competitions model feels very dated and to be honest quite boring, even has a Portuguese fan. The league certainly does not have the quality, and the focus should be in having middle of the table competitive teams. That does not exist, in terms of consistency, even when a new comer appears it quickly fades to a relegation (See Pacos Ferreira, Santa Clara, Estoril, Moreirense and Arouca a few years ago).

Guimarães in EL Q could actually be a good thing, because when they inevitably embarrass themselves with losing a favorable draw at least they would have a net of the ECL. And Braga or Porto in the ECL could be quite a point farm for the overall country coefficient.

I agree.
Its madness such big league for such tiny country/market with so low income. Yes big 3 make a lot on transfers and plus they have all the sponsors, and alll tv rights and UEFA money. What does that leave to rest teams?
And if you don't have real internal competition you won't be competitive long term. Being good or bad big 3 win their matches. You need to be very bad to lose some matches, like porto currently.

Where are the medium size teams that were always hard?
Boavista? Went to 3rd level and got up only by court decision.
Maritimo in II liga
Nacional II liga
Rio Ave was almost bankrupt
Belenenses gone
Guimarães, best season ever, and still their combined results against top 3 are weak. Even Braga results against top 3 only got more positive with Carvalhal.
Very unbalanced, level by low.
10 or 12 teams maximum, we can't have more than that. Then teams getting divided into championship group and relegation group is needed.

I'd say even more, what about a championship with only 4 teams? That would be way cooler!
Being serious, saying this in a year where the goal average has been way higher than previous years and where there are mid teams like Arouca and Famalicão - I mean, if the top-4 is demolishing everyone, it's because the league is weak, but if Porto and Braga are losing points against a lot of smaller teams it's because the league is weak too? Also I hate play-off systems, we have them here in the lower leagues and they're very unfair, a team can be in first plae by 20 points and then loses 2 or 3 games and they're out, it goes completely the logic of a league which is consistency, for one-game wonders we already have the cup

Whats the sense of a tiny market, with no external revenues having same size, same number of teams of Bundesliga or Ligue 1? None. The difference its huge.
Number of goals? Wtf does that mean? Look for the number of teams going into bankruptcy, failing to pay wages or desperately needing some shady owner. That are the numbers that matter. The value of the teams, the revenue generated by each team, the attendance and ticket sales (0, 0 and 0 for last 3 items).

Very competitive? Yes, by low. Porto its just a fucking mess losing to everyone. Its a fucking house on fire. Estoril beat them at Porto. Wow I Liga is competitive. You say. Estoril away victories this season:1. Porto its just a crap, reality check.

And mid teams Arouca and Famalicão? Mid teams in the aspect that they are in the middle of the table right? 35 and 40 points behind leader already, closer to relegation.

Mid teams where are they? Where are teams that were always hard to play against, always fighting for europe, teams like Boavista, Marítimo, Nacional, Rio Ave lately? All relegated, one brought back but as a corpse, and rio ave just avoid bankruptcy being brought by Marinakis. Middle pack just joined small teams. In some years they are just safer to relegation.

Portuguese league is garbage and thats why no one cares about it.

[ngfsmg]

I agree.
Its madness such big league for such tiny country/market with so low income. Yes big 3 make a lot on transfers and plus they have all the sponsors, and alll tv rights and UEFA money. What does that leave to rest teams?
And if you don't have real internal competition you won't be competitive long term. Being good or bad big 3 win their matches. You need to be very bad to lose some matches, like porto currently.

Where are the medium size teams that were always hard?
Boavista? Went to 3rd level and got up only by court decision.
Maritimo in II liga
Nacional II liga
Rio Ave was almost bankrupt
Belenenses gone
Guimarães, best season ever, and still their combined results against top 3 are weak. Even Braga results against top 3 only got more positive with Carvalhal.
Very unbalanced, level by low.
10 or 12 teams maximum, we can't have more than that. Then teams getting divided into championship group and relegation group is needed.

I'd say even more, what about a championship with only 4 teams? That would be way cooler!
Being serious, saying this in a year where the goal average has been way higher than previous years and where there are mid teams like Arouca and Famalicão - I mean, if the top-4 is demolishing everyone, it's because the league is weak, but if Porto and Braga are losing points against a lot of smaller teams it's because the league is weak too? Also I hate play-off systems, we have them here in the lower leagues and they're very unfair, a team can be in first plae by 20 points and then loses 2 or 3 games and they're out, it goes completely the logic of a league which is consistency, for one-game wonders we already have the cup

Whats the sense of a tiny market, with no external revenues having same size, same number of teams of Bundesliga or Ligue 1? None. The difference its huge.
Number of goals? Wtf does that mean? Look for the number of teams going into bankruptcy, failing to pay wages or desperately needing some shady owner. That are the numbers that matter. The value of the teams, the revenue generated by each team, the attendance and ticket sales (0, 0 and 0 for last 3 items).

Very competitive? Yes, by low. Porto its just a fucking mess losing to everyone. Its a fucking house on fire. Estoril beat them at Porto. Wow I Liga is competitive. You say. Estoril away victories this season:1. Porto its just a crap, reality check.

And mid teams Arouca and Famalicão? Mid teams in the aspect that they are in the middle of the table right? 35 and 40 points behind leader already, closer to relegation.

Mid teams where are they? Where are teams that were always hard to play against, always fighting for europe, teams like Boavista, Marítimo, Nacional, Rio Ave lately? All relegated, one brought back but as a corpse, and rio ave just avoid bankruptcy being brought by Marinakis. Middle pack just joined small teams. In some years they are just safer to relegation.

Portuguese league is garbage and thats why no one cares about it.

I thought of writing detailed answer for you, but some of those phrases are so over the top that I'm going to assume you're just having a bad reaction to Braga's bad season and Sporting's good one. Look, we're obviously not nearly as good as Bundesliga or Premier League and I would be ok with going back to 16 teams at the first division, but this year the quality of football has actually been way superior to the previous years (even that crappy Porto wasn't inferior to the English runner-up) and it's not like the system you said you liked has made leagues such as Belgium or Scotland consistently better than us

[rpo.castro]

I thought of writing detailed answer for you, but some of those phrases are so over the top that I'm going to assume you're just having a bad reaction to Braga's bad season and Sporting's good one. Look, we're obviously not nearly as good as Bundesliga or Premier League and I would be ok with going back to 16 teams at the first division, but this year the quality of football has actually been way superior to the previous years (even that crappy Porto wasn't inferior to the English runner-up) and it's not like the system you said you liked has made leagues such as Belgium or Scotland consistently better than us

The quality of football inside the pitch has decreased every single year. There would always be some weak teams with barely no football, but most would be fun to watch. Now most of the teams are just bad, with lack of play. Porto has having one of worst season and still top 3, benfica had bad 1st half with bad quality and was in title fight. Even sporting wasn't shinning. Football inside the picth is bad. If you watch a match withou any top 3 teams its even worse. Casa Pia-Guimarães, a match with 0, ZERO, shots on target. You can look at stadiums attendance. So many people watching great show.

The model "I" propose isn't better? I'm not saying that with the model that was presented in 2003 by an independent study as the only solution to make the competition sustainable we make us bundesliga level. Its the only way to prevent this spiral going down, the only to stop bankrupcies, Judicial interventions, having several clubs failling to pay their wages, its the only way to make the competition sustainable. We don't have dimension to have 34 professional teams. Its a small a country and a small market.

This situation just got deeper with pandemic and you can see how Porto, that was seen as a club with huge sales keeps failing UEFA fair play with huge depts (sporting and benfica have too and can easily go to a no return situation).

Clubs struggling or going/gone default this centruy:
-Boavista
-Rio Ave
-Guimarães
-Tondela
-Belenenses
-Marítimo
-Aves
-Setubal
-Académica
-Beira Mar
-Nacional
-Salgueiros
-Leixões
-Leiria
-Varzim
-Estrela Amadora
-Olhanense
-União da Madeira
-Naval
-Alverca
-Feirense
-Trofense

That's the reason why something must be changed, not the #of goals, the points or wins of sporting cp. Too many clubs going down (even some get back up with some shady businessmen, most to go down again) too many players and other workers left without their wages. This only clubs from I Liga XXI century.

2003 study:
https://maisfutebol.iol.pt/geral/23-07- ... s-solucoes
https://www.publico.pt/2003/07/23/despo ... to-1158395

[ngfsmg]

I thought of writing detailed answer for you, but some of those phrases are so over the top that I'm going to assume you're just having a bad reaction to Braga's bad season and Sporting's good one. Look, we're obviously not nearly as good as Bundesliga or Premier League and I would be ok with going back to 16 teams at the first division, but this year the quality of football has actually been way superior to the previous years (even that crappy Porto wasn't inferior to the English runner-up) and it's not like the system you said you liked has made leagues such as Belgium or Scotland consistently better than us

The quality of football inside the pitch has decreased every single year. There would always be some weak teams with barely no football, but most would be fun to watch. Now most of the teams are just bad, with lack of play. Porto has having one of worst season and still top 3, benfica had bad 1st half with bad quality and was in title fight. Even sporting wasn't shinning. Football inside the picth is bad. If you watch a match withou any top 3 teams its even worse. Casa Pia-Guimarães, a match with 0, ZERO, shots on target. You can look at stadiums attendance. So many people watching great show.

The model "I" propose isn't better? I'm not saying that with the model that was presented in 2003 by an independent study as the only solution to make the competition sustainable we make us bundesliga level. Its the only way to prevent this spiral going down, the only to stop bankrupcies, Judicial interventions, having several clubs failling to pay their wages, its the only way to make the competition sustainable. We don't have dimension to have 34 professional teams. Its a small a country and a small market.

This situation just got deeper with pandemic and you can see how Porto, that was seen as a club with huge sales keeps failing UEFA fair play with huge depts (sporting and benfica have too and can easily go to a no return situation).

Clubs struggling or going/gone default this centruy:
-Boavista
-Rio Ave
-Guimarães
-Tondela
-Belenenses
-Marítimo
-Aves
-Setubal
-Académica
-Beira Mar
-Nacional
-Salgueiros
-Leixões
-Leiria
-Varzim
-Estrela Amadora
-Olhanense
-União da Madeira
-Naval
-Alverca
-Feirense
-Trofense

That's the reason why something must be changed, not the #of goals, the points or wins of sporting cp. Too many clubs going down (even some get back up with some shady businessmen, most to go down again) too many players and other workers left without their wages. This only clubs from I Liga XXI century.

2003 study:
https://maisfutebol.iol.pt/geral/23-07- ... s-solucoes
https://www.publico.pt/2003/07/23/despo ... to-1158395

One game with zero shots can happen everywhere, but the number of goals per game is the highest in decades, and higher than other top-10 leagues. The attendances in Portugal are way lower than Premier League, Bundesliga, etc..., no one is denying that, but unlike what you said even those have been recovering slightly this year, with an over 12 thousand average for now, while it was under 10 thousand a few years ago
The financial difficulties are a real issue even if you list has most of those teams having their problems outside the top division (and are therefore not affected by the number of teams there) and you're really forcing some of those "strugglers" (Tondela and Rio Ave missed one payment and were punished, but they're not in a systemic bad situation), but the thing is they're an issue basically EVERYWHERE outside the richest leagues, we're not the exception. Look at Romania, look at Rangers in Scotland, which was one of the top clubs in a 12-club league like what you propose, and in a way is even more serious than problems in a few lower teams

[Francisco]

Some time ago I sent an opinion to "A Bola" that was published only online about my general opinion about this matter.

Sorry but I'm not translating my opinion to english, but after I'll make some comments in english about some of its points:

Liga 18 clubes vs Ranking UEFA


Após confirmada a queda de Portugal no Ranking da UEFA para o 7º lugar, A Bola tem publicado alguns artigos a defender medidas para melhorar a nossa Liga.

Concordo nos pontos que é necessário dar condições à “classe média” do nosso futebol para voltarmos a ter (e manter) 6 clubes nas competições europeias.

Acredito que a futura distribuição das receitas dos direitos centralizados de TV será uma ajuda para esbater as diferenças entre o pelotão da frente e os restantes. A subida de rendimento de clubes a partir do 5º posto é necessária para a melhoria do ranking e aumento de competitividade interna.

As diferenças advêm, e muito, das receitas da Champions League que provocam as desigualdades internas. Recordo que a liga holandesa (que nos ultrapassará no final desta época), faz uma distribuição de parte das receitas provenientes da UEFA pelos clubes que não participam. Algo não equacionado pelos clubes do nosso burgo.

A redução de clubes da 1ªLiga é o ponto em que discordo com as opiniões emitidas em A Bola. Compreendo os argumentos apresentados, mas não vi estudos/opiniões sobre os efeitos nos jogadores: a) redução de profissionais (em média menos 25/equipa) e b) ao nível dos jovens oriundos da formação que terão menos hipóteses de progressão em clubes da 1ªLiga.

Termino anotando que nenhuma liga com 16 (ou menos) equipas figura entre as 8 melhores classificadas no Ranking da UEFA. O problema não me parece ser o número de clubes, mas sim a falta de capital dos mesmos para melhorarem.

MAIN ISSUE: Our league doesn't have enough money to sustain a quality league (same problem as many other smaller leagues)
REDUCTION OF TEAMS: I don't believe that a reduction will solve the issue. We will lose players and spots for younger players to develop at portuguese top level. This means in the future we will start seeing youth academies not being as profitable as they are now. I remember when we had 16 teams, and only Sporting (and because it didn't had the money) was using it's youth players.
Reducing teams will only reduce the possibility of having a regular pyramid competition. It will become more exclusive for the same 20 something teams and that's it.
FINANCE: TV rights (most probably) won't solve all issues. The league is weak and won't get much good publicity outside of Portugal (with exception of the matches between the best 4 or 5 teams, most matches are very poor). So I don't see how having less teams would help, with the exception that the cake would have larger slices for each of the teams, but it would never be enough to make stronger teams (See Scotland, Austria, etc, championships with less than 14 teams are not in a good position in UEFA ranking, and don't have more than 1 or 2 good enough teams).
The future will probably pass by TV rights + foreigner shareholders/investors (something like SC Braga is starting to do with QSI).
Big teams (SL Benfica, FC Porto and Sporting CP) need to learn that it's not their league, so the TV rights should be divided in a much fairer way than they are today with individual rights. The portuguese league should follow a model like Premier League to redistribute the TV rights money, even if that means SLB, FCP and SCP receive less than they receive today. RIght now probably they receive more than 20 times more than other teams, and at top I would say ratio between 1st and 16th in the league shouldn't be higher than 1 to 5.

And for now that's my 2 cents. I probably have some other ideas I didn't touched, but when I have patience to write another lengthily text I will do it again