The 2015–16 season was

FC Porto Futebol Clube do Porto, MHIH, OM (), commonly known as FC Porto or simply Porto, is a Portuguese professional sports club based in Porto. It is best known for the professional football team playing in the Primeira Liga, the top flight of Portu ...

's 106th competitive season and the 82nd consecutive season in the

top flight Top Flight (April 15, 1929 – 1949) was an American U.S. Hall of Fame Thoroughbred racehorse. She was the leading American filly of her generation at two and three years of age. Background Bred in Kentucky by the very prominent horseman Harry ...

Portuguese football Association football ( pt, futebol), the most popular sport in Portugal, has a long and storied history in the country, following its introduction in 1875 in cities such as Funchal, Lisbon, Porto and Coimbra by English merchants and Portuguese ...

. It started on 15 August 2015 and concluded on 22 May 2016. For the second consecutive season, Porto failed to win any of the official competitions it was involved. The last time the team had two successive trophyless seasons was from 1979–80 to 1980–81. As in the previous season, Porto did not begin their campaign by playing the

Supertaça Cândido de Oliveira The Supertaça Cândido de Oliveira (; English: Cândido de Oliveira Super Cup, or simply Portuguese Super Cup) is an annual Portuguese football match played since 1979 between the winners of the Portuguese League (Primeira Liga) and Portuguese ...

, as they failed to qualify for the 2015 edition by not winning the

2014–15 Primeira Liga The 2014–15 Primeira Liga (also known as Liga NOS for sponsorship reasons) was the 81st season of the Primeira Liga, the top professional league for Portuguese association football clubs. It began on 15 August 2014 and concluded on 23 May 2015. ...

title (retained by Benfica) or the

2014–15 Taça de Portugal The 2014–15 Taça de Portugal was the 75th season of the Taça de Portugal, the premier Portuguese football knockout cup competition organised by the Portuguese Football Federation. The competition was contested by a total of 135 clubs, compri ...

(won by

Sporting CP Sporting Clube de Portugal, founded Sporting Club de Portugal (), otherwise referred to as Sporting CP, often known abroad as Sporting Lisbon , is a Portuguese professional sports club based in Lisbon. It is best known for the professional foot ...

). Their

2015–16 Primeira Liga The 2015–16 Primeira Liga (also known as Liga NOS for sponsorship reasons) was the 82nd season of the Primeira Liga, the top professional league for Portuguese association football clubs. The fixtures were determined by draw on 4 July 2015. The ...

debut match was a 3–0 home win against

Vitória de Guimarães Vitoria or Vitória may refer to : People * Francisco de Vitoria (c. 1483–1546), a Spanish Renaissance theologian * Alberto Vitoria (1956–2010), Spanish footballer * Rui Vitória (born 1970), Portuguese retired footballer * Steven Vitória (b ...

, with Cameroon striker

Vincent Aboubakar Vincent Aboubakar (born 22 January 1992) is a Cameroonian professional footballer who plays as a striker for Saudi Professional League club Al Nassr and captains the Cameroon national team. Aboubakar began his career at Coton Sport and moved ...

scoring the team's first official goal. Porto finished the league in third place with 73 points, 15 points behind three-time champions Benfica and 13 points behind runners-up Sporting CP, thus failing to win the title for the third successive season, which had not happened since the 2001–02 season. Besides the league, Porto competed in other domestic competitions. In the

2015–16 Taça de Portugal The 2015–16 Taça de Portugal was the 76th season of the Taça de Portugal, the premier knockout competition in Portuguese football. As of this season, it became also known as Taça de Portugal Placard due to sponsorship by sports betting game Pl ...

, they reach

the final Final, Finals or The Final may refer to: *Final (competition), the last or championship round of a sporting competition, match, game, or other contest which decides a winner for an event ** Another term for playoffs, describing a sequence of cont ...

, five years after their last appearance, but were defeated 5–4 on

penalties Penalty or The Penalty may refer to: Sports * Penalty (golf) * Penalty (gridiron football) * Penalty (ice hockey) * Penalty (rugby) * Penalty (rugby union) * Penalty kick (association football) * Penalty shoot-out (association football) * Penalty ...

Braga Braga ( , ; cel-x-proto, Bracara) is a city and a municipality, capital of the northwestern Portuguese district of Braga and of the historical and cultural Minho Province. Braga Municipality has a resident population of 193,333 inhabitants (in ...

, after a 2–2 draw at the end of

extra time Overtime or extra time is an additional period of play specified under the rules of a sport to bring a game to a decision and avoid declaring the match a tie or draw where the scores are the same. In some sports, this extra period is played onl ...

. The team also participated in the 2015–16 Taça da Liga, but were eliminated in the starting round after finishing last in their third-round group, with three defeats. In

UEFA competitions UEFA competitions (french: competitions de l'UEFA), referred improperly by the mass media as European football, are the set of tournaments organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA), generally in professional and amateur asso ...

, Porto started the season in the

2015–16 UEFA Champions League The 2015–16 UEFA Champions League was the 61st season of Europe's premier club football tournament organised by UEFA, and the 24th season since it was renamed from the European Champion Clubs' Cup to the UEFA Champions League. Barcelona were t ...

, having qualified directly for the

group stage A tournament is a competition involving at least three competitors, all participating in a sport or game. More specifically, the term may be used in either of two overlapping senses: # One or more competitions held at a single venue and concent ...

for the 20th time, a competition record shared with

Barcelona Barcelona ( , , ) is a city on the coast of northeastern Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within ci ...

Manchester United Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of City of Salford, Salford to ...

and

Real Madrid Real Madrid Club de Fútbol (, meaning ''Royal Madrid Football Club''), commonly referred to as Real Madrid, is a Spanish professional football club based in Madrid. Founded in 1902 as Madrid Football Club, the club has traditionally wor ...

. Having finished third in their group, Porto were demoted to the 2015–16 Europa League; they lost to

Borussia Dortmund Ballspielverein Borussia 09 e. V. Dortmund, commonly known as Borussia Dortmund (), BVB (), or simply Dortmund (), is a German professional sports club based in Dortmund, North Rhine-Westphalia. It is best known for its men's professional footb ...

with a 3–0 aggregate score and were eliminated in the round of 32.

Players

Squad information

Transfers

In

Loan in

Loan return

Out

Loan out

End of loan

Pre-season and friendlies

The pre-season started on 6 July 2015 and included seven preparation matches, six of which played outside Portugal. From 10 to 18 July, the team was based at Horst, Netherlands, and played two matches against Dutch and German opposition. Season preparations continued at

Marienfeld Marienfeld is a large (2.6 km² / 640 acres) grassy field on the reclaimed site of a former open-pit lignite mine about south-west of Cologne Cathedral in the city of Cologne, Germany, straddling the towns of Frechen and Kerpen. The min ...

, Germany, from 23 to 31 July, where Porto staged two more matches against top-flight German teams before competing at the inaugural Colonia Cup tournament on 1–2 August. The pre-season ended on 8 August with a match against

Napoli Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...

at the

Estádio do Dragão The Estádio do Dragão (; English: Dragon Stadium) is an all-seater football stadium in Porto, Portugal, and the home ground of FC Porto since 2003. It has a seating capacity of 50,033, making it the third largest football stadium in Portugal ...

, integrated in the team's presentation.

Competitions

Overall record

Primeira Liga

League table

Results by round

Matches

Taça de Portugal

Third round

Fourth round

Fifth round

Quarter-finals

Semi-finals

Final

Taça da Liga

Third round

UEFA Champions League

Group stage

UEFA Europa League

Round of 32

Statistics

Appearances and discipline

Goalscorers

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:2015-16 FC Porto season FC Porto seasons

Porto Porto or Oporto () is the second-largest city in Portugal, the capital of the Porto District, and one of the Iberian Peninsula's major urban areas. Porto city proper, which is the entire municipality of Porto, is small compared to its metropol ...