This was a strange season for Braga, that ended in a relatively disappointing 5th place. Bracarenses managed to combine a fight for 3rd place, at one point, to having to defend their 5th place near the end of the season. Braga had three different coaches during the campaign. The season started with José Peseiro at the helm. The results were being delivered, but the fans were slightly unhappy with the way the team always seemed to struggle to achieve narrow victories even against lower teams. The early knock-outs from both Europa League and Taça de Portugal gave the board the perfect context to sack Peseiro and hire Jorge Simão, who was having a great season with Chaves. However, the successful recipe Simão had at Chaves proved to be unsuited for a team with such responsibilities as the ones of SC Braga. With the new coach in charge, not only the performances continued to be disappointing but the team started to lose more and more points. Simão assumed Braga’s coaching position with the club at 3rd, and left it as 5th, by the time the board decided to bring Abel Ferreira in to be the coach for the last matches of the season, and to start the next one.
Last season’s undisputed star of the team, Rafa Silva left to join Benfica in the beginning of the campaign. At first, the crafty attacking midfielder/winger Pedro Santos assumed Rafa’s role as the team’s main source of creativity and chances creation. But some injury problems led Pedro Santos to drop form around December and, when a new creative point for the team – winger/attacker Wilson Eduardo – started to appear, an injury also took him out of action. The revelation of the first half of the season, midfielder Xaka, left to join French side Lille, mainly because the new coach at the time, Jorge Simão, had other plans for the midfield. A whole lot of important injuries (Pedro Santos, Wilson Eduardo, Ricardo Ferreira, Mauro, Rafael Assis, Vukcevic) and a couple of reckless technical options – namely the decision to take until then captain André Pinto out of the team – had a huge influence of the second half of the season decadence. Goalkeeper Marafona and Portuguese striker Rui Fonte were the few players that had a regular positive overall season.
On the bright side, some new young players came from the youth system and B team, showing that Braga’s academy is working very well. A particular attention should be given to talented winger/attacker Pedro Neto for the upcoming season.
