Chelsea sent scouts to Sporting’s away match at Rio Ave this Sunday, O Jogo reports.
It’s common that English clubs watch games of the Portuguese giants, which would be Sporting in this case, but all Chelsea could see yesterday was an impressive 3-1 Rio Ave win, with a disappointing performance from the Lisbon club, which probably spoiled the scouting mission.
Sporting had an excellent match at the Santiago Bernabeu last week in the Champions League. Despite Real Madrid’s late comeback, the Portuguese side controlled the match for most of the time.
The performance highlighted a few Sporting talents, such as Ruben Semedo, Sebastián Coates and Gelson Martins, and awoke the attention of the Spanish media.
Maybe that’s why Chelsea went to personally see what the fuss was about, since they haven’t been strongly linked with Sporting players recently.
But things didn’t go very well, and Sporting players didn’t get any ratings better than six out of ten from O Jogo.
That is, of course, if Chelsea were really scouting Sporting. It’s rare for English clubs to be interested in players from small Portuguese sides, but if this is the case here, then it’s worth the trip.
