Sporting CP slip to 4-2 defeat in third friendly in Switzerland

Jorge Jesus kept his team in his preferred 4x4x2 formation for this Saturday's encounter with Zenit and with Bruno César down the left and Gelson Martins down the right, Sporting looked terrorising going forward in the opening exchanges. Hernán Barcos proved a constant nuisance for the Zenit defence, with Alan Ruiz in support with some incisive passing and shots from range. Petrovic sat at the base of midfield, behind Bryan Ruiz (who was again given the captain's armband). Jesus repeated his defensive selection that opened against Monaco, with Schelotto, Coates, Rúben Semedo and Marvin Zeegelaar in front of Azbe Jug.

Although Sporting looked by far the most threatening early on, it was Zenit, who already had six pre-season matches under their belts, who took the lead after just seven minutes when Javi Garcia escaped Coates marking and headed in from a corner. The lead for Mircea Lucescu's side lasted just two minutes, thanks to a darting run by Gelson Martins and a final pass for Bruno César to net the equaliser.

Just as the team from Alvalade were again cranking up the pressure, Zenit made the most of two defensive blunders in as many minutes to go 3-1 ahead. First it was Zhirkov who struck with an effort that Azbe Jug should have done better to stop, before Rúben Semedo approached a header wrong and ended up setting Kerzhakov through on goal. There was still time before the break however for Gelson Martins to get a much deserved goal, after a decent pass from Barcos.

The second-half brought with it the expected slowing of the pace, with not even a string of Sporting substitutions (Alan Ruiz, Matheus Pereira, Petrovic and Gelson Martins for Daniel Podence, Bruno César, Palhinha AND Iuri Medeiros). able to inject any energy into the action. Some good team play did see Sporting edge back up the pitch, but the first chance was made to wait until the 71st minute, when Podence had a chance to get a shot away attempted to set up Slimani, and the opportunity fizzled out. Five minutes from time, Djordjevic made it 4-2 for Zenit.