Marked for Rodrigo Correia
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market17 May 2027
Only the photograph left for Rayhan Momade
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Rayhan Momade will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Sporting CP B the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad17 May 2027
Eduardo Felicíssimo was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad17 May 2027
Rodrigo Dias falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The dugout17 May 2027
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
The dugout17 May 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Rodrigo Correia, and the manager let it.
Market17 May 2027
The Samuel Justo story refuses to die
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Samuel Justo signs something — a contract at Sporting CP B or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad10 May 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sporting CP B this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad10 May 2027
Words at Sporting CP B training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rodrigo Dias is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
The dugout10 May 2027
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Squad10 May 2027
Lucas Dias has had enough of the bench
“I did not come here to warm up in front of people.” He is out of contract eventually, he is old enough to count the weeks, and Sporting CP B will have to give him a reason to stay or an exit.
Market10 May 2027
The name of Rafael Besugo keeps appearing in other people's back pages. Sporting CP B say nothing, which says plenty.
Market10 May 2027
The shop window has Miguel Alves in it
Sporting CP B have let the market know Miguel Alves can be had. No price in the advert, but everyone in the trade knows roughly what it says.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad29 Mar 2027
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Salvador Blopá is 20, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Market29 Mar 2027
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Guilherme Silva will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Sporting CP B the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Eduardo Felicíssimo was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Words at Sporting CP B training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rodrigo Dias is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
The dugout29 Mar 2027
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Eduardo Felicíssimo is on it.
The dugout29 Mar 2027
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Looking ahead29 Mar 2027
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Samuel Justo’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Sporting CP B needing him to play as if none of it matters.
Market29 Mar 2027
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Salvador Blopá’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
Market29 Mar 2027
The clock does Rafael Besugo’s negotiating for him
3 months left, and both sides know what that means: every week without a signature, the fee Sporting CP B could ask drops and the wages Rafael Besugo can ask rise.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match24 Oct 2026
6 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Sporting CP B may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Eduardo Felicíssimo and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Match24 Oct 2026
Vizela left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Sporting CP B are still strangers to each other
20 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Words at Sporting CP B training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rodrigo Rodrigues is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Francisco Silva trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 12. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.