Famalicão 0–3 Sporting. The Lions can’t stop winning | OneFootball

Sporting clocked up a ninth successive victory in the 2024/25 Primeira Liga season in Famalicão tonight.

The home team kept the Portuguese champions at bay for almost an hour, before goals by Viktor Gyökeres, Geovany Quenda and Gonçalo Inácio earned the Lions three more points and put pressure on Porto and Benfica to follow suite later this weekend. Quenda’s goal made him the youngest ever Sporting player to score in a Primeira Liga match.

José Ricardo Leite reports on the action at the Estádio Municipal 22 de Junho.

Famalicão 0-3 Sporting

And then it happened in the second half. After a poor first 45 minutes, the Lions found the way for their ninth win in a row in the Portuguese League. The game was not smiling for Sporting in the first half.

The tactics adopted by Amorim’s team frequently were not working. Thankfully for the green and whites, Evangelista misread what Famalicão needed for the second half and dropped back the defensive line, leading to a Sporting overload in the offensive areas and to an absolute stomp of a second 45 minutes.

A very tactical first half

Famalicão read well the Sporting team in the first half. With the Lions presenting in a 3-2-2-3 formation to overload the midfield and trying to make inside passes between the lines to serve Pote, Trincão and Gyökeres, the hosts did the same. Against the strong trio of Gustavo Sá, Topic and Zaydou, the Sporting midfield couldn’t do anything besides trying to free Gyökeres on the run and pray for a miracle from Pote or Trincão.

Famalicão, on the other hand, overloaded the midfield in a low-medium block and tried to surprise Sporting on the break with Sá and Zaydou distributing to Aranda’s diagonals or Rochinha’s speed.

The Lions scored, but Pote was offside, and Aranda also found the net at the other end with a beautiful header, but it was also ruled out for offside.

Almost at half time, Gustavo Sá got injured once again, and Mathias de Amorim was substituted on, and then Sporting’s Nuno Santos was forced off with what looks like a serious kneed injury.

Sporting take over in second half

The tactics adopted by Famalicão were one of the worst calls I have ever seen Evangelista make as a coach. After a massive first half, it was expected that the Fama Boys would turn up the heat by putting on Mário González and moving Aranda to the left. Instead, they dropped deeper than a DJ at a techno party from the first minute. When will teams understand that dropping back is an invitation for Gyökeres, Pote, Trincão, Bragança and Morita to overload the offensive areas? Furthermore, if you are so focused on defending through the middle of the pitch, you will get hurt on the wings.

Well, surprise, surprise. Quenda and Catamo (who came on for the injured Santos at half time) were unstoppable, a lot because of the space that Famalicão gave them. Zlobin tried to stop everyone from scoring. Trincão failed to beat him, Pote failed to beat him, Bragança failed to beat him. But Gyökeres… he never misses. The Swedish machine scored his 12th goal in 9 matches in the League, in a play that was started on the wing by Quenda.

After this, Famalicão got stomped. They couldn’t string together 5 passes to get out of Sporting’s web of pressure. The Lions were hungry for a second goal, and they got it through Quenda, with another play started on the wing.

Then, came the classical Sporting, as one of the few teams that can rest without the ball. Not pressuring, not pushing, almost not even running towards the ball. The energy-conservation approach did not stop the third goal, as natural as a goal can be. A cross into the box, a centre-back getting on the end of it, Gonçalo Inácio in this case.

Positives and negatives of the match

+ Viktor Gyökeres. There are no words to describe him. Another goal, another Sporting win, he just doesn’t know how to stop. If he plays well, he scores, if he plays badly, he scores. He doesn’t score when he doesn’t play. Simple as that.

+ Ivan Zlobin. What a monster. I am not the biggest fan of Zlobin. He is an up and down kind of goalkeeper who doesn’t offer any stability whatsoever on goal. But today, he was just amazing. If it wasn’t for him, the Fama Boys would’ve gone home with 6 or 7 goals conceded as a gift.

- Armando Evangelista. I can’t stress this enough. He lost the match on his own. Dropping down against Sporting is never a good idea because they have the players with the capability of overloading offensive areas. Moving up too much is also not an option. But Sporting get overwhelmed when they face a medium block team. They can’t get the ball through to Gyökeres and they can’t overload the midfield or play between the lines. The medium block is Amorim’s Achilles’ heel.

- Liimatta. One of the worst performances I have ever seen from an attacking midfield. He is like a poor right-back with the passing ability of a one-legged centre-back. And he plays attacking midfield. He couldn’t switch the play once, not even once. He missed most of his forward passes. And he had a clamorous miss that could have sent the match to a whole new level. Liimatta has all the time to grow and adapt to Portuguese football. The reality between Finnish football and Portuguese football is gigantic. But he cannot replace Zaydou in a match that you are still fighting for.

Final tactical nuances

Amorim expected a dropped back Famalicão. He failed in his analysis. That’s why he started Bragança and Morita. If Rochinha played better, he would’ve suffered at least one goal in the first half, because he misread the match from the beginning. Hjulmand was benched so that Bragança and Morita could be found more easily between the lines. They failed, and with Hjulmand on the pitch, he would’ve dropped back to a centre-back position and allowed Inácio and Debast to explore forward areas and maybe find the danger zone that the Lions love.

Gustavo Sá is injured once again. What a shame. He is a diamond, a true wonderkid. And he is so unfairly punished by injuries it just makes the Portuguese football lover sad. I hope he has a fast recovery so that he can soon get back on the pitch and help Famalicão reach the European spot they deserve.