Benfica have been linked with Talleres 18 year old youngster Favio Cabral according to reports coming out of Italy. Cabral who is a striker signed his first professional contract with Talleres in March until 2022 and has also been linked with Italian clubs Torino, Genoa and Parma. Talleres President Andres Fassi has acknowledged that Cabral is in the sights of several European clubs but did not reveal what the clubs asking price for the youngster would be. Benfica continue to look to add younger players to the squad as they look to land the clubs next promising youngster.
Benfica decided to change ten of the clubs starting eleven from the weekends league victory over Maritimo as they went into their second group game of the Taca da Liga against Covilha. Benfica opened their Taca da Liga campaign with a scoreless draw against Guimaraes and were not able to secure a road victory over second division side Covilha with only a late Jota goal earning Benfica a point in a 1-1 draw. Benfica now sit with two points from two games and will be hoping that tomorrows Setubal-Guimaraes encounter ends in a draw thus having all four group members sitting with two points each going into the final round of games on December 21. Raul de Tomas' struggles continued in this game as Benfica's biggest summer acquisition continues to falter, Jota scored his first goal ever for Benfica's main squad and Zivkovic came in as a substitute for his first appearance of the season. Bruno Lage will need to regroup the squad as they get set to kick off Week 13 on Friday against Boavista.
Bruno Lage hit his 50th game in charge of Benfica across all competitions this weekend and with Benfica's four goal performance against Maritimo this weekend, Lage became the second fastest Benfica manager to get to 100 goals in league action taking only 30 games to hit the century mark. Hungarian manager Lajos Czeiler is the only manager to get to 100 goals quicker then Lage when he did it in only 26 games back in 1963/64. Benfica are currently in negotiations to extend Lage's contract with the club and up his current salary of €500K to €1M. Lage's deal will also include a €20M buy out clause to protect the club from losing their current manager to any other clubs from around Europe.
