It took Sporting being among the eight best teams in the 2025/26 Champions League and fighting for a place in the semi-finals, this Wednesday, against Arsenal for Rui Borges to give up his defensive posture and assume the ambition of doing “something unprecedented” in the club’s history and achieving European glory never before achieved in the competition.
“I’m going to be very cold. The team has to be equal to itself. The ambition, courage and pleasure they have on the field and playing among themselves. We have to enjoy the game with inherent responsibility, of course, and behind something unprecedented for the club, for us as a team. We are aware of the difficulties. We’re going to face a great Arsenal and do what no one has done in the Champions League, which is beat this team. We know the difficulties we will have, but the confidence is infinite”, said the Leonine coach in the preview of the game with the Londoners.
“The flame is ambition and we all have a lot of it, that’s why we are here, competing for a ticket to the semi-finals. We are in the eight best teams, where no one would have thought we would reach, maybe only we believed… But it is the result of the quality of the team”, defended Rui Borges, without forgetting the other end-of-season fights. “We have to be aware that we are at the end of the season and involved in everything there is to compete for. And that clearly identifies Sporting. Being in competitions competing until the end, wanting to win them. And that is what defines a great Sporting. We are here fighting for the championship, the World Cup and the Champions League. What happens tomorrow in no way erases the great season of this team and these players”, according to the coach.
Regarding the message he gave to the players, the coach said he didn’t need to say much: “I look into their eyes and see the desire they have to play in the game, that they believe in a place in the semi-finals. Football and life give opportunities to those who believe a lot. And if there’s a team that believes a lot, it’s this one.”
Rui Borges also downplayed the possible casualties at Arsenal, in addition to Declan Rice and Odegaard, and revealed that Fresneda is absent for the game, in which Hjulmand and Quenda will already be available. Regarding the financial differences between the two emblems, the coach recalled that a Mercedes [Arsenal] can travel at 200 km/h, but the Peugeot [Sporting] also, despite being worth less: “It’s knowing shortcuts, roads and knowing how to divert and get ahead…”
And when asked if this could be the most important game in his career and in Sporting’s history, the Mirandelenense responded like this: “In my career it’s another important game, it’s all of them. And each one has their own story, their importance. We’re in the competition that everyone dreams of playing in, and me as a coach too. They as players… It will mark the careers of all of us. We want to continue marking the history of Sporting. This group deserves this recognition, it deserves to mark Sporting’s history at the level of Sporting’s great legends.”
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