Sporting in Europe: Rui Borges' Lions rise fastest, beat Porto and Benfica | OneFootball

Sporting and Porto’s European campaigns came to an end this week, with the Portuguese teams “falling” in the quarter-finals of the Champions League and the Europa League, respectively. Neither Portuguese side managed to come out on top on their trip to England, with Arsenal getting the better of the Lions and Nottingham defeating the Dragons.

The Lions recorded their highest-ever points tally in a European season across the entire competition, adding 27.500 points to the UEFA coefficient, the last of those points coming from the draw in London against Arsenal on Wednesday. With that score, they drew level with Benfica, their Lisbon rivals, although still 6.000 points behind, a gap considered significant.

Porto, meanwhile, end the European season with 24.000 points, and 80.750 in total over five years, the period used to form the ranking. A remarkable score, which allows the blue-and-whites to break into the top 20, but does not guarantee the Dragons that spot until the end of the season, since Aston Villa, who have qualified for the Europa League semi-finals, are very close behind Porto.

In any case, next season, once the results from the 2021/2022 season are removed, Porto will begin ahead of Benfica by 0.750 points and ahead of Sporting by 2.750 points. As for Braga, the win against Betis in Seville, and the resulting qualification for the Europa League semi-finals, earned the Braga side a rise of four places in the ranking. Thus, mathematically, if they win both semi-final matches and are crowned champions, the Warriors could climb another seven places by the end of the season.

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