José João, under-17 coach: “We must be at full strength” for Real SC | OneFootball

Leaders in the Championship Round standings with a comfortable advantage, FC Porto’s under-17s head into matchday 12 with a very clear warning ahead of their trip to bottom-placed Real SC. Between the danger of complacency, the characteristics of a “small” pitch, and the need to keep the team’s competitive identity intact, José João and António Neto delivered a message of vigilance and ambition. The coach summed it up bluntly and assured: “We have to be at full strength.”

There is an advantage in the table, but there is no room for easing off. In his preview of the match, FC Porto under-17 coach José João presented a team determined to stay true to itself, resistant to the context and immune to the temptation of treating the standings as a comfort cushion. The central idea ran through his entire statement: at the top, the level of demand does not drop.

When asked about the challenge awaiting the team against Real SC, José João rejected any simplistic reading of the game and highlighted the details that could make the task harder.

“It’s going to be a difficult game because it’s a tricky ground, a small one, where the ball doesn’t move perfectly. Real SC are a team with a lot of quick players up front and, because we’re facing the bottom side, there could be some relaxation, but we have to be very wary of that,” he said. “We have to understand that every game is worth three points and we have to be at full strength to keep this winning run going and maintain the gap to the second-placed team.”

In the coach’s words there was a double warning: for the opponent and for his own team. FC Porto go into the match on top, but their advantage in the standings does not remove the need for total focus, especially in a context that demands adaptation and competitive maturity.

This message fits with the way José João views the team’s day-to-day work, rather than just one isolated game. When speaking about the group’s internal response, he invoked the club’s identity and the idea of consistency built every day.

“At FC Porto, we always have to be at the maximum of our abilities. We have to look at each day as if it were the last day of our lives and always face it with our values and principles as a club and as a team,” he stressed. “From day one, the team has been very clearly aligned with this way of being, with these habits, and that’s why we’ve been working normally, we haven’t changed anything compared to the first phase. We have simply continued to nurture our process, our idea, our values and our principles so that we can become increasingly consistent and increasingly capable of performing at our maximum.”

More than promising intensity, the coach described a routine of high standards. His remarks point to a team that wants to extend its good form without distorting the process, seeing leadership not as an end point, but as a daily responsibility.

José João also made a point of offering direct recognition to those who support the team from the stands. The memory of the last match was recalled as a concrete example of the emotional impact that support can have in moments of greatest tension.

“I’d like to mention that in the last game we really felt the strength of our fans. When it was 2-2 and then came the corner for 3-2, we felt a push from the people who follow us and that was gratifying, it was good for us to feel that support because it pushed us a little towards making it 3-2. We hope that away from home, the people who follow us, especially our families, can continue to make us believe and keep pushing us so that we can always be at our best.”

The coach thus drew a link between performance and belonging, reinforcing that the energy coming from outside also helps sustain the response on the pitch. In a potentially uncomfortable game, that connection could once again be an invisible but decisive resource.

In the dressing room, António Neto reinforced the same line of controlled confidence. The midfielder spoke of a united group and of a week of work that prepared the team for a test with its own particular characteristics.

“In the dressing room we’ve been very united, very confident for another game, and we’ve worked very well during the week.”

The midfielder also stressed that the team knows it will have to be switched on from the very first play, without letting previous references interfere.

“We have to go in at full strength and with maximum concentration because it’s a different game; we mustn’t think about the match in the first half of the season.”

In António Neto’s words, you can sense a group trying to balance confidence and alertness. It is the same message that runs through the entire preview: anyone who wants to keep their distance from the competition must approach each round as if the standings still offered no comfort at all.

Before finishing, the midfielder also made a simple appeal to Porto fans, in keeping with the ambition to maintain the path the team has been carving out in the championship.

“We want you to support us strongly because we’re doing well in the championship and we want to keep it that way.”

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