Football Season Guide

The typical 4th place for Braga last season. They were far from the top trio, but even furthest from the 5th place. Bracarenses consolidated their status of 4th big, but at the same time they had a clear impression that they are still far from competing for the top places. Braga was never able to clinch a strong sequence of wins, and didn’t handle European competitions that well, either. Carlos Carvalhal left and team's former centre-half and captain Artur Jorge will be the new manager. Artur Jorge did a good job with B-team and the change seems positive, since Carvalhal appeared to be fatigued and out-of-focus in latter months. Artur Jorge worked with a lot of the young talented players that Braga possesses. It seems he’s thinking of a 4-3-3. Mattheus will remain in goal for his 9th season in a row. At the back, Braga saw the great David Carmo leave to join bigger team Porto. Skilful wing-back Yan Couto also left. Niakaté arriving from France and Gomez from Spain will be the respective replacements for Carmo and Couto. In midfield, Braga resisted against many attempts to take the excellent Al Musrati away; keeping the Libyan would be a great step towards success this season. Castro, A. Horta, Lucas Mineiro and hot talent Gorby are the other (very valuable) options for the centre. In attack, Ricardo Horta will be very hard to keep (heavily linked with big teams), but there’s Iuri Medeiros eager to be more of a technical reference for the team. Vitinha and Abel Ruiz will keep their titanic dispute for the striker position, but the club brought Simon Banza as well. Most of Braga’s success in coming years (including this very next one) will depend on the confirmation of an unusual high number of young talents: Moura, Bruno Rodrigues and Fabiano (back); Gorby and Schurrle (midfield); Roger, Rodrigo Gomes, Falé and Vitinha (attack).