ABC are the opponents for handball's season launch | OneFootball

The handball team will begin the season against ABC, the Minho club that has been crowned national champion 13 times and finished the 2025/26 edition of Andebol 1 in sixth place. The match is scheduled for 8pm next Tuesday, 18 August, at Dragão Arena, with ticket sales expected to begin soon.

Coached by Filipe Magalhães, the Braga-based club has in its squad a player well known to Porto fans: Fábio Magalhães, a backcourt player who wore the FC Porto shirt between 2018 and 2025, a period in which he won four National Championships, two Portuguese Cups and two Super Cups in blue and white, will return to Invicta as a visitor.

FC Porto

The 2026/27 season marks the start of a new chapter for blue-and-white handball, now with Carlos Martingo as head coach. The coach acknowledges that the role “brings a feeling of pride, but also of great responsibility” and intends to “steadfastly defend the values of the club and the working group”, as he revealed in an interview with Dragões.

“You can expect a team that will show a lot of energy and fight for every ball as if it were the last,” guarantees the new coach, who wants to “make Dragão Arena a living hell for everyone” and believes FC Porto “will have a say in the championship”.

The squad has two new additions. Xavier Barbosa, a backcourt player arriving from AA Avanca, “stands out for his ability to unbalance opponents one-on-one”. Meanwhile, pivot Guilherme Borges, a Brazil international signed from French side Istres Provence, “can add creativity in attack and is a good finisher”.

Alongside the new signings, Carlos Martingo will also be able to call on young players developed at the club, with “the quality to be FC Porto athletes and add value to the squad”. Pedro Antunes, Eduardo Costa, Diamantino Djanló and Armando Coelho are part of that group, with the latter only 14 years old.

ABC

Founded in Minho in 1933, ABC is the third most successful club in Portuguese handball, surpassed only by Sporting and FC Porto. It is also the only Portuguese club to have reached a Champions League final: in 1994, it lost the trophy to Spain’s Teka Santander, 45-43 on aggregate over the two legs.

In addition to the 13 National Championships already mentioned, Académico Basket Clube – created, as the name suggests, with the original aim of establishing itself in basketball – has won 12 Portuguese Cups, seven Super Cups and one international trophy. That was the Challenge Cup, won in 2015/16 against Benfica in a two-legged tie, with an aggregate score of 53-51.

A historic clash

FC Porto and ABC have faced each other 60 times in matches for the National Championship, the Portuguese Cup and the Super Cup: 50, seven and three, respectively. The record favours the Dragons, who have won 45 times, with four draws and 11 defeats. In the 29 home matches, Porto have won 20, drawn three and lost six.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇵🇹 here.