Nacional agreed to release Santos to return to Petro de Luanda

On 20 October, Alexandre Santos’s assistant coaches led Nacional’s training session. Santos said goodbye to the squad afterwards, bringing his brief spell at the club to an end. Nacional’s next match was at home to Braga on 25 October, leaving little time to absorb the departure before another test.

Nacional agreed to release Santos with immediate effect so he could return to Petro de Luanda, the club he had coached before. The departure followed four defeats in four matches, including the cup loss that ended Nacional’s run in the Taça de Portugal. It leaves the club making a second coaching change this season, with Bruno Abreu in interim charge while a permanent successor is sought. The urgency is plain: after eight league matches, Nacional have four points and sit 16th. With their attempt to stay in the Primeira Liga already under pressure, the next appointment and the interim spell matter at once.

He had signed through the end of the season, and keeping Nacional in the division was his stated priority, Record reported.

It is another step in my career, which is already a long one, but I had not yet reached the top division as a head coach. And that is a landmark moment for any coach.

That ambition had little time to take shape. Santos, 49, was in charge for a little over a month, and his four league matches brought defeats by Alverca, Famalicão and Rio Ave before the cup tie that ended his tenure.

The final loss came away to Sanjoanense on 17 October. Nacional were beaten 1-0 by a fourth-division side in the Taça de Portugal’s third round, with Nigerian forward Sani Maxwell scoring the winner in the 82nd minute, O Jogo reported. The result eliminated Nacional from the competition and left Santos’s first top-flight appointment in Portugal without a win.

He coached there from 2021 to 2024 and is returning to replace João Pedro Sousa, Record reports. His previous spell brought a run of domestic success that gives this appointment a different shape from his short time in Portugal.

Under Santos, Petro won three consecutive Angolan league titles, as well as two Angola Cups and a Super Cup, according to Record. The team also reached the African Champions League semi-finals in 2021/22, the group stage the following season and the quarter-finals in 2023/24. Those campaigns marked three successive appearances in the competition, with Petro progressing to the last eight in Santos’s final season.

His first departure came in May 2024, after three years in charge. Santos described the decision as personal, family-related and professional, while Record reported that he had chosen in advance to end the cycle, regardless of whether Petro won more trophies.

João Gião left after the fourth round, when the side had one win, one draw and two defeats; every point Nacional had collected by 20 October came under him. Santos took charge in the sixth round, after Bruno Abreu had briefly stepped in.

The table showed how little room the club had to make another change without consequence. Nacional had six defeats.

Abreu’s earlier spell lasted one match: an away trip to Sporting in the fifth round. Nacional lost 2-0. Record reported that Abreu changed both the line-up and the team’s system for that game, before Santos arrived for the next round. Now the interim coach was set to take charge again, this time with the club still searching for someone to lead it permanently.

After the Sanjoanense defeat, Santos said Nacional had made chances but failed to finish them. He also pointed to the pitch, saying it had stopped his side playing its usual football in the opening 15 minutes; he felt they adapted after the break and created more opportunities.

We created chances to score and did not take them.

Santos said Nacional had been trying to win from the start, but conceded a goal with ten minutes left and could not respond. The club’s public focus was on what comes next: president Rui Alves said Nacional wanted a coach with a winning profile to pursue its stated objective of staying in the Primeira Liga. The club has not announced who will take that role.

Nacional’s vacancy came amid another coaching change in Portugal’s top flight. On 20 October, Braga were eighth with 11 points when Carlos Vicens left after a 2-1 defeat to Gil Vicente; Franclim Carvalho was appointed as his replacement, RTP reported.

For opponents, an unsettled bench can make preparation less certain. Before Sporting faced Nacional, coach Rui Borges said the change made it harder to predict their tactical approach. He said his side concentrated instead on its own development, Nacional’s players and the threat from set pieces.

That uncertainty leaves us more focused on what we are as a team, on our process, on our individual and collective growth.

Borges also noted that Nacional had used more long balls in their first four league matches. He expected a new coach to bring different demands and a possible change in defensive approach, making it harder to know which version of Nacional would appear.

The club had not set a date for naming a permanent coach. A Bola reported Nandinho among the leading candidates and Daniel Sousa as a possibility, but president Rui Alves did not confirm interest in Sousa.