Gil Vicente vs FC Porto 1999/2000: Dragons fail sixth straight title as Gil stun Porto, Sporting crowned champions | OneFootball

Tomorrow FC Porto travel to Gil Vicente in the first match of the segunda volta (second lap) of what is proving a trying season for the Dragons, their new president André Villas-Boas and their new coach Vítor Bruno. It is a far cry from where the club were a quarter of a century ago, as Porto chased their SIXTH Portuguese championship title in a row.

However, Porto would be stunned by a Gil Vicente side in rude health. Football historian Miguel Lourenço Pereira takes us on another trip down memory line to the day the “Bi-Tri” died...

Nobody in Portuguese football had ever won five league titles in a row. No one did afterwards. In May of 1999 FC Porto touched the sky winning at the José Alvalade stadium to end the myth that winning five couldn’t be done.

Of course, at that time the only other only side ever able to claim four league titles in a row – the so-called Tetra – had been the famed Sporting of the Cinco Violinos back in the early 1950s, so winning league title number five at the Lions’ home ground was special. Even more so because the first league title of that historic sequence, back in 1995, had been precisely won at that same ground.

Porto supporters felt invincible back then and many were already thinking about the sixth win, a sequence they dubbed the “BiTri” – twice three times champions. What nobody could have expected back then was that just a year later it was Sporting who would be laughing as Porto travelled to Barcelos to end what was supposed to be an iconic campaign in utter disaster.

Goal machine Jardel does his part

If you had Mário Jardel in your squad, winning the league title shouldn’t be hard. Ever since the Brazilian landed in Portugal, three years before, Porto had won the league easily with the striker’s goals proving ever-decisive. He would later repeat the feat in the Sporting shirt, in the 2001/02 campaign, making the 1999/2000 the only time in his complete seasons as a player in the league that his side failed to be champions.

What is more incredible is that, precisely over that season, Jardel scored more goals than anybody else. He had claimed his first European Golden Boot the previous season – scoring 36 goals for the Dragões – but in 1999/2000 he netted two more to make it 38. He lost the famed prize to Kevin Philips however, from Sunderland, only because the award committee considered that the number of goals scored in the five big leagues had extra value compared to those scored in second-ranked tournaments such as Portugal’s championship. Philips scored 30, eight goals fewer, but won the prize.

Mário Jardel: the Brazilian was the definition of goal machine during his time in Portugal

The second-best scorer in the Liga Portugal that year was the Argentinian striker Beto Acosta, who netted 22, almost half of those of the Brazilian. Yet Acosta proved key in Sporting’s run to the title, something many believed was impossible when the club sacked the Italian manager Carlos Materazzi – father of the famed international centre-back Marco Materazzi – in late September. Sporting’s start had been poor but Porto weren’t exactly shining. It was actually Benfica who first dominated the season, having led from the fourth round up to the twelfth.

It was only then that the reigning champions took hold of the competition during winter. Sporting also swiftly overcame Benfica and mounted a title chase, although many believed that Jardel’s goals would suffice. Porto also had to deal with the Champions League demands, as they qualified for the second group stage – an innovation implemented that season that implied an extra six matches – and then for the last eight where they would face Bayern Munich.

Former Porto player Augusto Inácio turns things around at Sporting

While Sporting were only focused on domestic football, key signings during the winter transfer window and the unexpected silent leadership of Augusto Inácio, promoted to first-team manager and a former league champion at Porto, both as player and assistant manager to Bobby Robson, helped the Leões keep up the pursuit. The side had the leading figure of Peter Schmeichel in goal and a side that mixed veteran key players such as Acosta, Pedro Barbosa, Iordanov, Edmilson and Rui Jorge – the latter two also former league champions for the Dragões – with youth prospects such as Beto, Vidigal and Delfim as well as signings like César Prates, Mbo Mpenza, Ayew Kwame, Ivone De Francheschi, André Cruz and Facundo Quiroga.

Crunch match

When the two sides faced each other for the title decider, a crass mistake by Porto’s right-back Carlos Secretário after a perfectly executed free-kick by André Cruz gave Sporting the lead in the table that they wouldn’t relinquish for the nine matches that were still to be played.

But Porto didn’t throw in the towel. Fernando Santos – already a league champion and future winner of Euro 2016 – had at his disposal one of the greatest squads the club had ever assembled, with the likes of Vitor Baía, Jorge Costa, Deco, Drulovic, Capucho and, of course, Jardel in their ranks. They kept on winning and closing Sporting down up until the last round.

Fernando Santos had led Porto to their fifth successive title but could not make it six in a row

The Dragons had to travel north to Barcelos while Sporting went to the city of Porto to play against Salgueiros at the old Vidal Pinheiro ground. The maths was simple. Sporting only needed a win, Porto had to win hope Sporting dropped points in the other match to win their sixth title in a row. Tension was at an all-time high and more so because both sides were also due to face off each other the following week in the Portuguese Cup Final as well.

Gil’s memorable season

For the many travelling fans to Barcelos, it wasn’t supposed to be a threatening trip for the Dragons but Gil Vicente were having the time of their lives. The Minho side had only been promoted to the first division for the first time back in 1990. Since then they became a regular mid to lower table side, able to sign players with high potential such as the Serbian winger Ljublinko Drulovic, who would become a Porto legend, and were only relegated once, in 1997. They bounced back straight away and under the helm of Álvaro Magalhães, a former Portuguese international and Benfica icon, and they turned out to be the surprise package of the season.

Magalhães had several youth prospects in his ranks, such as future Portuguese International Petit as well as Ricardo Nascimento and Carlitos, and the side played a very straightforward counter-attacking style with high pressing and intensity all over the pitch. Gil started the campaign on a high and they led through the first three rounds to the surprise of many. As the season progressed, though, things weren’t always as fun and for the majority of autumn and winter Gil established themselves in mid-table, a very decent position taking into consideration their low budget and that they were recent newcomers after getting promoted back to the first tier.

Gil Vicente player ratings as per A Bola

Gilistas fight for European berth

But as Vitória SC and Marítimo started to flounder, so Gil took their chances and went on a winning streak that led them to fourth on the league table. That was also the year that, with the end of the Cup Winners Cup, Portuguese football had just been granted four places in the continental competitions for the following season, so if Gil wanted to play in Europe, they had to clinch that spot. It was a titanic affair against not only Vitória and Marítimo but also Boavista, runners-up the previous season, that had dipped in form but were resurfacing at the end of the season as well. In the penultimate round, Boavista did eventually end Gil’s prospects of continental football. Still, there was a fifth spot to be grabbed, the best finish in their history and Magalhães’ men were all for it even if that meant beating the reigning champions doing their utmost to claim the title with their final breath.

On 14 May, more than three thousand supporters at the old Adelino Ribeiro Novo stadium hosted the visitors who came in full force, with Santos opting for Domingos as partner to Jardel in attack, backed up by the creative trio of Capucho, Deco and Drulovic and only Paulinho Santos as a holding midfielder in a 4-1-3-2 that he rarely used.

Opening goal sparks celebrations… at two stadiums

Gil, in contrast, stuck to their usual starting line-up with Guga and Carlitos partnering in front of midfielders Petit, Casquilha, Nascimento and Diocleciano while veterans Paulo Jorge, Bessa, Lemos, Lomba and Martins played in defence. Gil had already held Sporting to a draw at home that season and as the sides reached half-time, it was still goalless. That was up until centre-back Lemos took advantage of a corner to open the scoring with three minutes to play in the first half. The goal was celebrated loudly in Barcelos but even more joyously at the Vidal Pinheiro, where Sporting was being held to a draw by the home side. If Porto needed that result to press for the title through a win, going back to the changing rooms on the losing side was the worst-case scenario.

By the time Drulovic, a former local glory, managed to grab the equalizer, on the hour, with a low shot from outside of the box, Sporting were already hammering Salgueiros, perhaps extra motivated by Inácio’s team talk at halftime and the news that came from Barcelos. Without feeling the extra pressure, the Lions were again their best version of themselves and an already downbeat Porto allowed Gil to score the winner in the 72nd minute after a Carlitos run that left Hilário, Baía’s understudy (today, in 2025, the newly contracted England goalkeeper coach alongside Thomas Tuchel), helpless.

Porto player ratings as per A Bola

Historical result

Porto had never lost in Barcelos and ten years would go by without that happening again, but the win allowed the locals to cling on to that fifth position in the league table, above Minho powerhouses Vitória SC and Sporting Braga.

Porto’s failure in Barcelos had nothing to do with Sporting celebrating their well-deserved league title. That they weren’t able to mount extra pressure on a side that were eighteen years in waiting for such a night, was another story. Porto failed to claim the eagerly anticipated sixth title and never again did a Portuguese side come even close to achieving that feat. Eventually both FC Porto between 2005 and 2009 and Benfica from 2014 to 2017 won four league titles in a row but on both occasions, they cancelled each other out to prevent a second Penta in the history of the Portuguese league. Sporting only has that 1950s winning streak to show for themselves, as they haven’t been able to win back-to-back titles since then.

Two decades on Gil finally make Europe

Gil Vicente, however, did eventually manage to claim that European spot they so merited that year. Several seasons went by before played their first-ever final – the League Cup lost against Benfica in 2012 – and in 2021/22 they once again finished fifth clinching a place in the Conference League preliminary rounds. They were beaten by Dutch side AZ Alkmaar, but the side guided by Ricardo Soares at least managed to offer their local fandom the experience they were denied twenty years prior owing to the change in the UEFA rankings.

Gil Vicente have become over the years a well-respected first-division side and despite the admiration for the team that first got promoted to the top flight and the later iteration who eventually made it to Europe in the post-COVID season, there is an everlasting devotion to that squad who put an end to FC Porto’s dominance with a win that no-one will ever forget around those parts.