FC Porto put their recent troubles behind them by beating Vitória de Guimarães 3-1 in the Portuguese Cup semi-final second leg for a 4-1 aggregate win to book their place in the final at Jamor against Sporting.
Nelson Oliveira gave the visitors a perfect start by scoring in the opening minute to level the tie on aggregate, but Porto, inspired by livewire Francisco Conceição, roared back to score three goals without reply from Mehdi Taremi (penalty), Conceição and Pepê.
Porto and Sporting will play against each other in the traditional season finale on 26 May.
Sérgio Conceição, Porto coach:
“The players implemented our strategy well, congratulations to them. It’s an entirely fair result.
The win doesn’t give us anything – here we don’t celebrate winning games, we celebrate winning trophies. We’re happy but now we’ll look forward to Casa Pia, and ending the season as well as possible ahead of playing the Cup final.
“This is the spirit we have to show until the end of the season to lesson the impact of a league season that did not go well by winning the Portuguese Cup.”
Álvaro Pacheco, Vitória coach:
“It was a great game, between two teams who wanted to get to Jamor. We started well, scored from our first chance and then controlled the game in terms of shots and opportunities.
“Porto scored from a transition and the team got nervous, but we were never out of the game. We had more shots and ball possession but we needed to be more effective in the final third. We were close to making it 2-2 and that would have unsettled Porto.
“But I’m proud of our run and the quality we showed in this semi-final tie. We deserved more but our dream is over.”
FC Porto 3-1 Vitória SC highlights
