Bragança

The fixture that matters most in Bragança still isn't in a national competition. It's the Dérbi de Trás-os-Montes, played against Sporting Clube de Mirandela, a rivalry that carries the whole northeastern corner of Portugal rather than any single trophy.

Grupo Desportivo de Bragança was set up on 11 June 1943 by Alberto Rodrigues and Eduardo Gonçalves, at a time when the club had to register with the Vila Real Football Association because Bragança's own body did not yet exist; it only joined the reactivated Bragança Football Association in 1953. For its first three decades the team trained and played at Campo das Alminhas before the move, in 1977, to the Estádio Municipal de Bragança.

The club has spent most of its life shuttling between the third and fourth tiers, winning the old Terceira Divisão four times, in 1978–79, 1985–86, 1999–00 and 2002–03. Its best cup runs came a generation apart: in 2000–01 it beat Rio Ave before losing to FC Porto in the Taça de Portugal quarter-finals, and in 2006–07 it repeated the feat, knocking out Naval before falling to Os Belenenses at the same stage.

What the club is remembered for outside Trás-os-Montes, though, is the academy. Beto Antas, who spent years there as player, coach and academy director, spotted a teenage Pizzi and pushed him into the first team at 17. Pizzi left for SC Braga and went on to play for the Portugal national team, a path the yellow-and-blue shirt has produced only rarely.

The Estádio Municipal now holds around 7,000 people.