S.C. Salgueiros

Salgueiros
	150px
Full name	Sport Comércio e Salgueiros
Short name	Salgueiros
Founded	December 8, 1911; as Sport Grupo e Salgueiros
Home colours	Away colours

Sport Comércio e Salgueiros (Portuguese pronunciation: [spɔɾ kuˈmɛɾsiu i saɫˈɣɐjɾuʃ]), commonly abbreviated as SC Salgueiros, is a sports club founded on December 8, 1911, in Paranhos (Porto), Portugal.

History

Founding

In 1911, a group of friends (João da Silva Almeida, Aníbel Jacinto and Antenor) decided to fund a football club after watching a game that opposed F.C. Porto and S.L. Benfica at the Campo da Rainha. The friends would gather after work and dinner at lamp 1047 between the Constituição and Particular de Salgueiros streets to debate ideas and build their new club. Thus was formed Sport Grupo e Salgueiros.

The club had no money at the time, so the three founders decided to gather money by singing Christmas songs from door to door during the 1911 Christmas season. They collected a total of 2800 reis, which was enough to purchase their first football. They decided their jerseys should be red like Benfica's as a way to separate themselves from city rivals F.C. Porto.

Their first pitch would be at the Arca D'Água, and the team's first matches were against Sport Progresso, Carvalhido Football Club, and others.

Merging

In 1916/1917 the team name was changed to Sport Porto e Salgueiros as a matter of local pride (and maybe also for its similarity with Sport Lisboa e Benfica). However, in 1920, after a profound economical crisis, Sport Porto e Salgueiros decided to join forces with another local club named Sport Comércio. This resulted in the name change of Sport Comércio e Salgueiros. The club would play in the first division for several years.

Recent crisis and decline

The senior football team, facing perhaps its biggest economical crisis since its foundation, was administratively relegated from the second national division (liga de honra) to the second national division B North (segunda divisão B, zona Norte) in the season 2004/05. Due to the financial crisis, all the players in the 2004/05 season were non-professional, mostly upgraded players from the junior team.

The club had also recently lost its emblematic stadium, (Estádio Engenheiro Vidal Pinheiro), which had been sold to the city hall in order to build a subway station at its location, and had no home arena in which to play their matches or to practice.

Due to the dramatic financial situation, the team folded on the end of the 2004/2005 season.

Comeback

Salgueiros made its comeback to senior football as a new club named Sport Clube Salgueiros 08 for the 2008–09 season. However the youth teams remained using the Sport Comércio e Salgueiros name. The name of the club was changed because Sport Comércio e Salgueiros was prevented from registering professional players due to financial debts. They played in the Porto Football Association Second Division, coming first in their series, gaining access to the final which decides promotion to the Porto Football Association First Division. They managed to win the final and gain access to the First Division. The following season the club finished second on Serie 1 and was promoted to the Porto Football Association League of Honour. In 2011–12, led by former international player Carlos Secretário, Salgueiros 08 again finished runner-up in the League of Honour and was promoted to the Portuguese Third Division. In 2012–13, they were promoted again to the Campeonato de Portugal, the third-tier of Portuguese football. On December 8, 2016, the club announced it had regained the rights of the original Sport Comércio e Salgueiros and would return to its former name and symbols at the start of the 2016–17 season.^[1]

Honours

Segunda Divisão: 2

1956–57, 1989–90

Campeonato do Porto: 1

1917–18

Taça de Honra do Porto: 2^[2]

1976–77, 1979–80

European performance

1991–92 UEFA Cup - 1st Round
Date	Home	Result	Away	City
19/09/1991	Salgueiros	1-0	Saint-Cannes	Porto (Bessa)
03/10/1991	Saint-Cannes	1-0 (2–4 p)	Salgueiros	Cannes

Sports

The club has excelled at several sports, such as football, water polo, handball and athletics. Despite the fact that Salgueiros doesn't have a swimming pool, the water polo team, coached by Nuno Mariani, won its 12th national title in a row in 2006. After being runner-up in the 2007 championship Salgueiros renewed the national title in 2008.