From "ingratitude" to Suárez's miss: Rui Borges on Braga v Sporting | OneFootball

After the 2-2 draw against Braga, Rui Borges, coach of Sporting, analyzed the match in a press conference. The coach expressed his belief that there is some 'ingratitude' regarding the result and highlighted a "failure". Check out everything he said.

Bitter about drawing in stoppage time?

"It ends up being a bit ungrateful to concede a goal after the 90th minute, just like last season in Alvalade. That's football. We've also scored beyond the 90th minute. In the first half, we started well, and Braga scored on their only approach to our goal, in a play where we could have done more, been more proactive. A very good first half, with pressure and approaches to the opponent's goal. In the second half, we dropped a bit, and it became more difficult to take the ball from Braga's players. They had more possession, but only two shots on our goal. We were lower, but we controlled, being more exposed as we were closer to our goal. It was important to make SC Braga uncomfortable without the ball, and we couldn't. Braga ended up being lucky with the goal at 90+3. It's a point we add, and we'll see at the end of the championship if it was important to add or if we lost two points."

Did the team show fatigue?

"It can't be an explanation. It's natural that in the second half we lost energy. We should have been more proactive. Braga put a lot of people in the center of the field. But I insist that it can't be an excuse, as we could have scored more goals. Braga believed, and that's football."

Difficulty holding leads? What was the intention with Quaresma's entry?

"We always had a line of five, so nothing changed at all. Eduardo Quaresma came in to give more consistency to the defensive line, as Diomande is not at his best, as he is going through Ramadan. Eduardo [Quaresma] came in well and didn't stop being a right-back and even made good runs down the wing. It seems we are destined to suffer in the final moments against Braga."

What has failed in these games and the classic between Porto and Benfica

"I won't talk about it, it's not my game, and it's not my place. Holding leads? Only if it's about the two games with SC Braga. It's part of it, we've also scored goals at 90 and beyond. Your rhetoric, until now, was that Sporting had been winning in stoppage time for five consecutive games, and now we also conceded, just like in the first round. Once again, it's part of it."

Preparation for the match and attention to ball exit

"We worked on that a bit because the same thing happened in Alvalade. A lot of man-to-man and controlling the depth, with our full-backs having to be very alert in the interior covers. We tried to find other movements, and Diego [Rodrigues] had already played like this against V. Guimarães, but he played more across the whole field, and it became complicated to maintain references. It was defined that Fresneda had to seek the reference, and he did that very well. We had two or three quick attacks where we could have scored. SC Braga's defensive transition isn't that good, and we knew we could attack there. We lacked better definition. We lost energy because it's a huge strain, and it's natural that we lost a bit of energy."

Suárez's play and Maxi Araújo's 9th yellow card

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