João Pereira admits Sporting first-team spell turned into a nightmare | OneFootball

was the one chosen by Frederico Varandas to succeed Rúben Amorim in 2024/25, when the coach moved to Manchester United in November 2024. Despite the backing, the manager was not successful at Sporting, making way for Rui Borges, who won the League and the Portuguese Cup.

As such, the now Alanyaspor coach thanked his successor. “He was my guardian angel. Being associated with not winning a national title would have haunted me for the rest of my life. Thankfully, Sporting became champions and won the Portuguese Cup,” he said in an interview with Sport TV.

Regarding his spell with the green-and-whites, he says he is “very much at peace with the past” and supports Varandas’s decision to renew Rui Borges’s contract - who is already preparing for next season. “It was the right decision,” he explained, admitting his “regret for not having lived up to” the faith placed in him by the President of the Alvalade club.

“It hurt me because of everything he managed to do at Sporting; he lifted Sporting in recent years, putting the club in the fight for titles, not only in football, but in all the other sports as well. Now it’s easy to say it was a mistake. But the president had been following my work since the under-23s. When we got to the first team it didn’t work out; I could make a thousand excuses about referees, but others, even with refereeing decisions and injuries, won. More than a tactical problem, it was psychological. With the loss of Ruben Amorim, I didn’t have the ability to rally the troops at that moment", he said.

It should be noted that while in charge of the green-and-whites’ first team in the national championship, João Pereira managed just one win in four matches. The final tally shows two defeats, one draw and only one game from which he emerged victorious. All told, from a possible 12 points, he picked up only four.

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