“AND even a coach at the level of the best in the world. When we look at some international names, who are in the best teams in the world, I would put Paulo (Fonseca) there, without the slightest doubt”, the now coach of Dinamo Bucharest, leader of the I League in Romania, told the Lusa agency.
For Nuno Campos, who followed the ‘lions’ coach for 15 years before launching himself as head coach, Paulo Fonseca is today “a very experienced coach, with the world”, who has worked with some “of the best players today” and “very complete in his idea of ​​the game”.
“He likes to make his teams play beautiful football”, in other words, “he likes to be dominant” and, for him, “winning is not enough”, analyzed his former assistant.
And despite being “young”, at 53 years old, he is “very prepared” for the new challenge.
“Sometimes, we confuse the age of coaches with experience. Today, Paulo (Fonseca), being new, is an experienced coach who has been through a thousand and one contexts and is extremely prepared for all of them. His experience, knowledge, leadership, are at an exceptional level compared to the best in the world”, he reinforced.
It is, therefore, “the right time to join your favorite club”, considered Nuno Campos, after highlighting, in a telephone conversation with Lusa, from Bucharest the ability of Portuguese football to attract back technicians of the stature of his former team leader.
“Before him came Marco Silva (at Benfica), who spent years in the Premier League (English First League), and now it is a huge privilege to also be able to count on Paulo (Fonseca) in Portuguese football. The growth of Portuguese football is to be praised”, he praised.
Portuguese coach Paulo Fonseca signed a three-and-a-half-year contract with Sporting, replacing Rui Borges as coach of the Lions, after leaving Lyon, the Alvalade club announced on Wednesday.
Paulo Fonseca, 53, returns to Portuguese football after 10 years of absence, in which he successively coached Shakhtar Donetsk (Ukraine), Rome (Italy), Lille (France), AC Milan (Italy) and Lyon, which he left in third place in the French League, after nine rounds, three points behind leader Paris Saint-Germain.
The Mozambique-born coach finds Sporting also in third place in the I League, but nine points behind FC Porto, which leads the Portuguese championship thanks to a 100% victorious campaign in the first 10 rounds, and four behind Benfica, in second place.
Paulo Fonseca will take the place of Rui Borges, who was removed from the ‘Leonine’ technical command on Sunday, after two years in charge, in which he won a ‘double’ that had eluded Sporting 23 years ago, in his debut season, in 2024/25, which began under the guidance of Ruben Amorim and with João Pereira’s brief spell leading the team.
The new coach of the Alvalade club left Portugal at the end of 2015/16 – after having won the Portuguese Cup with Sporting de Braga – to coach Shakhtar Donetsk, where they became Ukrainian champions and won the Ukrainian Cup in the following three seasons (2016/17, 2017/18 and 2018/19), having also won the Super Cup of that country in 2017/18.
Before leaving Portugal, Paulo Fonseca also won a Portuguese Super Cup, in 2013/14, in a short and unsuccessful spell at FC Porto, one of the three clubs he coached in the top tier of national football, along with Paços de Ferreira and Braga.
