📏 Form Guide

Nacional

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Nacional will be looking for an improved result here following a 2-1 Primeira Liga defeat last time out to Vitória Guimarães.

In that match, Nacional had 43% possession and 14 shots on goal with 4 of them on target. The only player to score for Nacional was Chiheb Labidi (92'). On the other side, Vitoria SC had 9 shots at goal with 4 on target. Noah Saviolo (70') and Rodrigo Abascal (87') scored for Vitória Guimarães.

It has not been often in recent games where Nacional have kept a clean sheet. The facts show that Nacional have seen their defence breached in 6 of their previous 6 matches, shipping 9 goals in the process. Such a pattern won’t necessarily be sustained into this next game, of course.

Santa Clara

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Following on from a losing effort in their last game against Porto in Primeira Liga action, Santa Clara will be hoping to turn things around here.

In that game, Santa Clara had 43% possession and 12 shots on goal with 0 on target. At the other end, Porto got 8 shots on goal with 5 on target. Aghehowa (50') scored for Porto.

In 5 of the past six games featuring Santa Clara, a relatively low number of goals have been struck between them and opposing teams. The overall average goals scored per game within that period comes to a paltry 1.33, with the average goals for Os Açoreanos standing at 0.5.

Taking a look at their past results, Santa Clara:

• haven't beaten Nacional in away games against them for the last 2 league games.
• are without an away win for the past 5 league matches.

👥 Head to head

A glance at their prior head to head clashes dating back to 06/12/2020 shows us that Nacional have won 2 of these games & Santa Clara 3, with the tally of drawn games standing at 1.

In all, 16 goals were produced between them in this period, with 6 of them for Os Alvinegros and 10 coming from Os Açoreanos. This gives an average number of goals per game equal to 2.67.

The previous league game featuring these sides was Primeira Liga match day 27 on 30/03/2025 when it ended Santa Clara 1-0 Nacional.

That day, Santa Clara managed 37% possession and 13 shots at goal with 5 of them on target. The scorer was Costa (3').

On the other side, Nacional had 9 attempts on goal with 4 of them on target.

The referee was Miguel Fonseca.

📋 Team News: Nacional

Ivanildo Fernandes (unknown injury), Ulisses (unknown injury) and Filipe Soares (unknown injury) won’t be playing for Nacional manager Tiago Margarido.

It seems likely that Os Alvinegros will possibly opt for a 4-2-3-1 formation this time, beginning the first half with Kaique Pereira, Joao Aurelio, Leonardo Santos, Ze Vitor, Jose Gomes, Matheus Dias, Liziero, Pablo Ruan, Miguel Baeza, Paulinho Boia and Jesus Ramirez.

ℹ️ Team News: Santa Clara

We’re of the thinking that Os Açoreanos appear most likely to begin the game with a 5-3-2 system using Gabriel Batista, Sidney Lima, Luis Rocha, Henrique Silva, Lucas Soares, Paulo Victor, Sergio Araujo, Jose Tavares, Klismahn, Vinicius and Gabriel Silva.

🧠 Prediction

We are of the inclination to think that Santa Clara and Nacional could both end up scoring in what appears to be a good match-up, with little separating these two teams.

Let’s see how it plays out, but a draw is looking likely to us. That’s why we have predicted a tight encounter with a 1-1 score draw at the end of the 90 minutes.

Lucas Pereira, 15:09 11/01/2026