Vasco Matos hails FC Porto’s fighting spirit this year | OneFootball

Vasco Matos lavished praise on FC Porto, Santa Clara's opponent this Sunday at Estádio de São Miguel. The Azorean coach even stated that the dragons «have the best defense in Europe» and that his team will need to have «the ability to quickly move the ball out of pressure zones» and «clarity to understand which spaces» they should exploit. The coach also criticized the «incidents» of recent matches against the big teams, particularly against Sporting, and considered that, due to refereeing errors, his team «should have more points». Here are Vasco Matos's full statements in the preview of the game.

– Santa Clara will try to do what no one has yet managed: to beat FC Porto in the League…

– We intend to play our game and fight for victory, which is what defines us. We know we are facing a quality team that is having an excellent campaign, but we have to do our job and we really want to win this match.

– How do you manage the type of game that FC Porto has been presenting?

– We know well the strength of FC Porto. It's a team with a lot of physical capacity that presses the opponent intensely. We have to be able to quickly get out of those pressure zones, look for spaces, and move the ball differently to reach the opposite flank. FC Porto puts a lot of people forward and, therefore, presses hard at the decisive moment; they have very physical players, and we can't make it easy there. Many of FC Porto's goals result from ball recoveries in the final third due to this ability. We have to read the game and have the clarity to understand which spaces to exploit, which is one of the keys to the match. We want to have the ball, but also identify where we can have it and how we will have it. We studied FC Porto well and worked on these dynamics; now, within the game, the players have to interpret and apply these instructions.

– Santa Clara has not been lucky with recent refereeing in games against the big teams, especially with Sporting. How are the players feeling on the eve of a game against a big team?

– These incidents have cost us some points. The team has been playing well and evolving, we have also been investing in many young players, as part of the administration's project, with the under-23 and under-19 teams having an excellent campaign. We have managed to launch several young players. Of course, these situations have caused us setbacks in terms of points – in my opinion, we should have more points in the standings – but it's part of the game. We have to face this naturally, continue our work, be aware of what we are doing, and value the assertiveness we have shown in many moments. These are situations we cannot control and, I believe, are not intentional; they happen in a heated moment and bother us, but we have to move forward, continue working, focused on developing our collective game and individualities, with the right energy and proper recovery of the players. This break was important to recover energy, and if we are united on the field, we will achieve our goals by keeping the work focused.

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