Rui Borges’ rapid rise from lower leagues to Sporting’s league and cup double | OneFootball

Rui Borges has risen from Portugal’s lower leagues to become Sporting Portugal’s standard-bearer after transforming the club’s fortunes.

L'Équipe notes that the 44-year-old delivered last season’s league and cup double, Sporting’s first since 2002, despite a modest playing career that never reached the top flight.

He was only six months into the Vitoria Guimaraes job, with few references, when Sporting paid €4m to appoint him as Ruben Amorim’s successor after Joao Pereira’s brief one and a half months.

His calling card was a standout 2023-2024 with Moreirense in his first top-flight season, finishing sixth with a club-record 55 points. He turned down lucrative offers from abroad, judging Vitoria the step he needed.

Before that, he learnt his trade in the second tier with Académico de Viseu, Académica de Coimbra, Nacional Madeira, Vilafranquense and Mafra, after Mirandela in the third from 2017 to 2019.

Colleagues describe a meticulous student of the game, relentlessly positive, convinced a situation can be turned around, and adept at building close teams.

At Sporting, he faced initial scepticism and first parked his preferred 4-2-3-1 to retain Amorim’s back three, then returned to it this season. The football has been attractive, with 50 goals in 18 league matches, even if Sporting trail leaders FC Porto by seven points. They have also strung together three home Champions League wins for the first time.

PSG visit on Tuesday at 21:00 in the Champions League, a timely gauge of how far Borges’s Sporting have come.

Source: L'Équipe