Welcome to our new feature called Club in Focus. Every Friday, we will be looking at a Portuguese club and giving some information, interesting facts and a brief overview of their history! Portugal is full of clubs with intriguing histories and at Próxima Jornada, we want to publicise these stories!
To kick off the series, we are looking at SC Vianense!
SC Vianense are a club located in Viana do Castelo, a region in Northern Portugal, and when we say Northern Portugal, we mean it! If you move further north above Viana do Castelo, you cross over into Spain and head towards the city of Vigo.
The club was founded on March 13, 1898. For the first 25 years of the club’s existence, it focused on other sports but in 1923, alongside the creation of the Football Association for the District of Viana do Castelo, SC Vianense created a football team. SC Vianense continued to practice various other sports alongside football, including hockey, which exploded in popularity in Portugal in the 1950s.
In its early days, the club competed in the Campeonato de Portugal, however, this was not the same competition that we see today which shares the same name. It was not a round-robin tournament but was a cup competition, similar to the modern-day Taça de Portugal. SC Vianense first competed in the 1923/24 season, competing alongside FC Porto, Vitória FC, Olhanense, Academica OAF, União Portalegrense and SC Tomar. They made it to the semi-final and lost 3-1 to Porto. They competed in this competition until the 1933/34 season.
League and Cup History
In more modern times, SCV have played across a multitude of different competitions, from the Campeonato do Portugal (which they currently compete in), to the old Segunda Divisão, a league that they played over 600 games in before the restructure in 1990.
They have competed in just under 150 games in the Taça de Portugal, a prestigious domestic cup competition encompassing teams from the top-flight down to the very bottom of the Portuguese pyramid. In 1960, the club went on a good run, knocking out Estoril and Portimonense before losing 6-0 to Benfica, the same Benfica team which won the Liga that season and won the European Cup the following year, with the likes of Mário Coluna, José Águas and Eusébio in their squad.
Stadium
SC Vianense play at the Estádio Dr. José de Matos in Viana do Castelo. The club bought the stadium in 1929, after having played on it for the previous few years, borrowing it from Viana Taurino Clube. Since then, the stadium has undergone multiple renovations.
Interesting Facts
Francisco Trincão and Pedro Neto, both circled in the photograph below, played together at SC Vianense in their youth and are now playing together many years later at Wolves in the Premier League!
Jorge Mendes, the man we now know as football’s super-agent, once played for SC Vianense! As a 20-year-old he moved to Viana do Castelo and played for the club as a left-winger, he also opened up a small video store.
We hope you’ve learned a little bit about this club from Viana do Castelo, and stay tuned for next week’s edition of A Club in Focus.
