The time for big decisions in Portuguese football is approaching and the 25th round of the I League will have an important weight in the final calculations – even if after this round there are still nine more to go. The time has come for the top four to measure their strengths against each other. And there is a lot at stake.
Minho test. The itinerary for this weekend of strong emotions begins in Minho, where tomorrow, at 6pm, Sp. Braga will host two-time national champion Sporting, in what will be, at least in theory, the most complicated trip for the Leonine team until the end of the competition – the other away matches will be against Alverca, Estrela da Amadora, AFS and Rio Ave.
With Sp. Braga comfortably placed in fourth place, with no chance of fighting for the title (they are 20 points behind the leader, FC Porto) and increasingly focused on their campaign in the Europa League (they will face Ferencváros next week in the round of 16), the greatest pressure will be on the shoulders of Rui Borges’ team, who know that they will have a test of fire at Pedreira in the fight for their third championship (a feat that only happened twice in the history of Sporting, in the 1940s and 50 of the last century).
The good news for Leão fans is that the team is going through a good moment. Since losing, in January, to Vitória de Guimarães in the semi-finals of the League Cup, Sporting has recorded 10 victories (among them, one against European champion Paris SG) and a triumphant draw, at Dragão, thanks to a penalty goal in injury time which, at the time, prevented the Dragons from extending their lead in command to seven points. Tuesday, the victory against FCPorto in the Portuguese Cup was worth another boost of energy. You will hardly find a better time to approach a trip to Braga with full confidence.
All or nothing in the Light. Sunday, the emotions head to Lisbon. Benfica-FC Porto (18.00), in Luz, is mainly decisive for the home team. A defeat widens the gap in relation to the Dragons to 10 points and conditions the dispute for 2nd place, which is worth a place in the 3rd qualifying round of the Champions League (depending, naturally, on Sporting’s result the day before).
Benfica is the only one of the big three that has not yet lost in the League – and that unbeaten record is something that José Mourinho will want to cling to to encourage the team. FC Porto, on the other hand, needs to defend the advantage it has been accumulating in the championship at all costs. The strong investment made by André Villas Boas in the team for this season – both in the summer market and now in January – was a kind of all-in of the Porto president to return to a successful path, which appeared threatened by the club’s negative accounts in the final phase of Pinto da Costa’s management. The game of Light will be an important milestone in understanding whether the presidential strategy remains firm or more threatened.
And how about an F1 marathon? The 77th Formula 1 World Championship begins this weekend in Australia and the new regulations bring one of the biggest revolutions in recent years (journalist Ricardo Simões Ferreira explains all the changes on DN Sport). The 8th season of the series is available on Netflix Formula 1: Drive do Survivewhich spans the entire 2025 World Cup until the final consecration of Lando Norris, from McLaren, the young Brit who manages to put an end to the long reign of the Dutchman Max Verstappen (four consecutive titles at Red Bull).
With almost total access behind the scenes of the circuit, the series has helped to catapult the popularity of the sport in recent years, because it goes far beyond the competition and has thus captured new audiences that go far beyond motorsport fans. It shows the intrigue, the rivalry, the business, the personal lives of the pilots, and it continues there, as a kind of Big Brother at high speed. With a plot that you almost want to say that even fiction could not imagine. It’s well worth a television marathon, with popcorn in hand to whet your appetite until the engines roar again at the Australian GP.
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