Taxus Baccata

by | Mar 15, 2018 | Taxus Baccata

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Pedro Valdemar Soares Gonçalves (born February 7, 1976) is a Portuguese football manager.[1] He is currently the coach of Angola national team.[2]

Career

Gonçalves began his coaching career at Amora Futebol Clube in 1997, still as an assistant. Later, he moved to CD Cova da Piedade and then joined Sporting Clube de Portugal in 2000, first as a scout, and then as youth coach in 2001. He coached at Sporting's academy until 2015.

Also in 2015, he left to Angola where he was in charge of the under-15 and under-17 squads of Primeiro de Agosto, and later won the Angolan league. In 2018, he was appointed as Angola national under-17 coach. In the same year, he won the COSOFA Cup[3] and was the protagonist of Angola's first ever qualification to the under-17 World Cup after finishing in third place of the African Cup of Nations.[4] He made history after qualifying for the round of 16.

After coaching the Palancas Negras' U-20 and U-23 teams, Gonçalves became the Angola senior national team coach in 2019,[5] a position he currently holds. He secured Angola's qualification to the 2022 African Nations Championship,[6] which was held in 2023, finishing the competition in second place of Group D.

In September 2023, he made history once again by qualifying the Angolan national team for the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations,[7] thus becoming the only Palancas Negras coach to qualify for both the African Nations Championship and the African Nations Cup.

Pedro Soares Gonçalves led Angola's best-ever group stage performance in the AFCON by picking up 7 points and two wins, something the Palancas Negras have never done before.[8] In Group D with Algeria, Burkina Faso and Mauritania, the Angolans finished first and qualified for the knockout stages of the competition.

Angola's brilliant performance was highlighted on BBC Africa with an article,[9] describing how the Angolans exceeded expectations and proved the critics wrong. The Palancas Negras broke yet another record by winning their first ever AFCON knockout round, beating Namibia 3-0 in the last 16. They were then eliminated in the quarter-finals by Nigeria with a 1-0 defeat.

In June 2024, Pedro Soares Gonçalves reached 50 matches for the Angolan national team. The following month, he led Angola to win the COSAFA Cup, the first in 20 years, also becoming the most successful coach in the history of the Palancas Negras, with 24 victories. Angola secured 4 wins in 5 games, including a 5-0 thrashing of Namibia in the tournament final. [10]

Honours

As manager

Angola U-17

References

  1. ^ "Pedro Soares Gonçalves".
  2. ^ "Football/Angola: FAF confirms Pedro Gonçalves in Palancas Negras".
  3. ^ "Portuguese coach take Angola to victory in the COSAFA Under-17 Cup".
  4. ^ "Angola for the first time in the FIFA U-17 World Cup".
  5. ^ "Pedro Gonçalves: A success story from Alcochete to Angola".
  6. ^ "Angola qualify for the CHAN by defeating South Africa 4–1".
  7. ^ "Angola qualify for AFCON 2023".
  8. ^ "Angola imposes itself in a historic edition".
  9. ^ "Afcon 2023: Angola out to prove critics wrong and deliver happiness".
  10. ^ https://www.rtp.pt/noticias/futebol-internacional/pedro-goncalves-leva-angola-a-conquista-da-taca-cosafa-20-anos-depois_d1584420
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