Sporting, message to Juve: fifth victory in a row in Portugal

A health walk or a little more. It’s not ideal for measuring your fitness, but that’s more than fine at Sporting. With this easy success over Santa Clara (3-0), increasingly bottom in Primeira Liga and who hasn’t scored points for two months, third place represented by Braga – who will take the field tomorrow – is only three lengths away. However, Ruben Amorim’s team still has one game to recover. In short, the positive period continues even after returning from the break; the consecutive victories in the championship become five, in between also the prestigious elimination of Arsenal from the Europa League which earned them qualification for the quarter-finals, where they will face Juventus in less than two weeks.

THE MATCH

—

Not at all intimidated by the opponent, Amorim has no qualms about deploying his Sporting with the offensive set-up, namely the one that foresees Gonçalves on the midfield line and the Edwards-Trincao duo to inspire the lone striker Paulinho. The predictions are right, because you play practically only one goal and the attacking trident will score with all its components. Santa Clara’s resistance lasted only fourteen minutes, the green-and-whites found the advantage at the first opportunity: free-kick on the trocar by Gonçalves, headed by Paulinho. On 22′ it was already time to update the result. Edwards intercepts an unholy horizontal pass from Almeida, takes the field and serves Trincao, who strikes Gabriel with a precise diagonal. The match could already be over in the first half and Sporting came close to scoring the third goal twice, first with Inacio who headed the crossbar following the development of a free-kick (33′) and then with Paulinho who hit the split badly on a ball under carries and sends high (41 ‘).

THE RECOVERY

—

However, just wait seven minutes of the second half for the 3-0, with Santa Clara doing nothing to avoid it. The protagonist of a reckless pass this time is Sagna, Paulinho thanks and supports Edwards, who controls and shoots into the top corner from a few meters away. Gabriel, innocent of the three goals, earns the palm of man of the match for him with a good save on Ugarte’s shot from the edge (60 ‘). For both coaches, the match doesn’t have much to say in the final twenty minutes and they make seven substitutions in block. Amorim wants to dose his strength in view of the recovery with Gil Vicente on Wednesday and let Alvarade embrace Luis Neto once again, ex Siena and leader of the Sporting dressing room, who hadn’t played an official match since last September due to a serious knee injury. The Santa Clara goalkeeper was still decisive in the 81st minute, when he had a great reflection on Gomes’ undersized strike. In the final Andrezinho almost closes the gap, his left foot in the center of the area is rejected by the post. For the green-and-whites, therefore, it is an evening of celebration, the best way to enter the hottest phase of the season.