Nacional was arguably the worst team of the league, and unsurprisingly ended in the very last place, eleven points behind the other team relegated to second division. After four consecutive defeats in the start, a couple of victories gave the impression Nacional would be heading for another untroubled season, like usual, but soon the bad results started to become the norm and, by the time the 15th round arrived, Nacional had only 11 points, and was already in relegation zone, reason why Manuel Machado was sacked, and Jokanovic was once again called for the job. However, the Serbian coach didn’t bring anything better, and eventually he was sacked as well, by the 26th round, without winning a single match during the 11 rounds he was in charge. João de Deus was the next man in line, but in the 8 remaining rounds, Nacional only had one victory and one draw. With still four games to be played, Nacional already knew their fate for next season. After 15 seasons in the Portuguese top flight, Insulares are going back to second division.
As a result of such an unsuccessful campaign, there were very few positive individual performances during the season. Midfielder Aly Ghazal was arguably the most influential player in the team when he left in January, to join the Chinese league. Striker Okacha Hamzaoui promised a good season with a couple of good performances, including a hat-trick at Santa Maria da Feira, but some injury problems and inconsistent performances led him to have a tepid campaign, altogether. Nacional signed with several players on January that had some impact on the team, at one point: striker Fernando Aristeguieta, attacking midfielders Zizo, Zequinha and Mezga and central midfielder Filipe Gonçalves were unquestionably quality players that could have been much more useful if they have been in the squad since pre-season. The only two players that had a positive season from beginning to start, despite the collective shipwreck, were midfielder Vítor Gonçalves and full-back Nuno Sequeira. While the midfielder was only a first team choice for six times, but managed to have always a good impact on the team when coming in from the bench as well, Nuno Sequeira was an absolute first choice for the left side of defence and, unlike his teammates from the backline, Sequeira was always having good individual performances, making the opponents search for the other areas to upset Nacional’s defence.
