Six years later, Estoril will be returning to second division. And this happened precisely in the one season where Estoril had more investment going on. The connections with Brazilian football continued bringing several players to Estoril, and this time around some very sounding names were arriving at ‘Clube da Linha’, such as promising centre-half Lucão, and the already established goalkeeper Renan Ribeiro, both arriving from São Paulo. It was all in vain as, for some odd reason, Estoril was never able to found stability during the season. At some point, it was quite visible the nervousness that was dominating the players, as the results were failing to come on terms. On top of that, Estoril had an abnormal amount of important injuries throughout the campaign, which was felt in specific moments of the season. There were times where Ivo Vieira had to come up with a completely improvised backline, as all natural defenders were unavailable.
Pedro Emanuel tried to pick from where he left the team in the last rounds of the previous season, where he was able to bring the very best from that group of players. However, something happened in between the two seasons, because Pedro Emanuel was completely unable to bring it back for this season. After a couple of promising victories on rounds 2 and 3, Estoril immediately got into shock by going through a sequence of 8 defeats that extended into 11 matches without winning. Pedro Emanuel could only resist up until the sixth defeat in a row.
Ivo Vieira brought visible improvements. Not only Estoril only lost against Benfica In Ivo vieira’s first five games, it was also clear that Estoril was playing a much more free flowing, attacking football. Estoril was now not afraid to have the ball and assume the initiative. And a strong reason for this slight improvement was the inclusion of Lucas Evangelista on the team. After a couple of weeks it was blatantly visible that the left-footed Brazilian was a great talent, and one couldn’t but wonder what may have happened for him to be only introduced on first team football so late in the season.
After two defeats, Estoril continued their good moment, and had a great sequence of three wins, arguably the best that Estoril was able to do during the whole season. That sequence included a flashy home win over title contenders Sporting.
However, the team was still not in full confidence. It took a couple of setbacks, against Belenenses and Chaves, to bring the team down once again. Ivo Vieira’s attractive, but also imprudent style may have also helped for Estoril to become at the mercy of astute opponents. The heavy home defeat to Braga (0-6) was definitely felt in the group, specially since it brought the team into the very bottom of the table. Estoril was then unable to get out of relegation zone any more until the end of the season.
The already mentioned Lucas Evangelista was by a mile the best man of ‘Canarinhos’, this season. The way the Brazilian bossed the midfield and arrived at the opponent’s box always with danger was good enough to feed many rumours of him being linked with several bigger clubs, such as Benfica. Kléber was sadly out most of the time with injury. The former FC Porto striker participated in only 17 matches, but that was enough for the Brazilian to be the team’s top goalscorer with 6 goals. Renan Ribeiro had also a good season and has also been linked with some big teams.
