Fan for a Match: Sporting Clube de Goa

Before the international break (which I refuse to complain about) we restarted The Offside’s Fan for a Match series, where we pick one of the world’s lesser known clubs, tell you a little about the team and its history, and then support said team for the weekend. The first recipient of our support was the surprisingly storied Royale Union Saint-Gilloise, of Belgian Third Division B.

Unfortunately, RUSG lost 1-0 away to Hasselt. Worse, they have failed to update to their YouTube site since October 1st. So we learned two lessons there. First: Don’t rely on third division Belgian teams to update online media. Second: When choosing a Fan for a Match team, don’t choose a team that’s playing away from home that weekend. Common sense.

So this week, I’m picking a home team. That team is Sporting Clube de Goa, of the I-League in India. Their crest above and to your left, and an introduction to the team is after the jump below…

Sporting Clube de Goa, has a short but interesting history. They were known as Cidade de Goa until 1999, when Peter Vaz and Edgar Afonso took over, rebranded the club Sporting Clube de Goa and modeled it after Portuguese giants Sporting Clube de Lisbon. So that explains the name and the crest then. Since 1999, it’s been up, up and up.

Sporting started in National Football League 2nd Division in 2000/01, failed to qualify for that same division in 2001/02 but returned to win it in 2002/3 and earning promotion to the NFL 1st Division for the 2003/4 season.

Sporting stayed in the top flight for the next few years, even finishing runners up in 2004/5, so were an established top flight team when the rebranded I-League came along in 2007/8.

According to their official profile page, Sporting struggled in their first I-League season due to the departure of Nigerian star striker Dudu Omangbemi, who now plays for Debreceni in Hungary. They avoided relegation but finished a disappointing seventh.

2008/9 was a much improved season, with Sporting leading the I-League early on before slipping to third. Somewhat bizarrely Nigerian coach Clifford Chukwuma was replaced before the 2009/10 season due to a “lack of qualifications”, which is a little worrying. Sporting seem to have found a fitting replacement though, at least ethnically speaking. New coach Roy Baretto is Portuguese, but of Indian descent.

Sporting are currently second bottom of the I-League, which means relegation zone. But don’t worry, they’ve only played one game. This weekend they’re at home to Pune FC.

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Category: World Football