João Mário Neto Lopes (born 3 January 2000), known as João Mário, is a Portuguese professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby lea ...

who plays as a

right-back In the sport of association football, a defender is an outfield player whose primary role is to stop attacks during the game and prevent the opposition from scoring. Defenders fall into four main categories: centre-backs, full-backs, sweepers ...

or winger for

Primeira Liga The Primeira Liga (), also known as Liga Portugal Betclic for sponsorship reasons, is a professional association football league in Portugal and the highest level of the Portuguese football league system. Organised and supervised by the Liga ...

club

Porto Porto (), also known in English language, English as Oporto, is the List of cities in Portugal, second largest city in Portugal, after Lisbon. It is the capital of the Porto District and one of the Iberian Peninsula's major urban areas. Porto c ...

and the Portugal national team.

Club career

Born in

São João da Madeira São João da Madeira (), officially the City of S. João da Madeira (), is a city and a List of municipalities of Portugal, municipality in northwestern region of the Portugal, Portuguese Norte Region, Portugal, Norte region. It's part of the la ...

Aveiro District Aveiro District (, ) is located in the central coastal region of Portugal. The capital of the district is the city of Aveiro, which also serves as the seat of Aveiro Municipality. Aveiro District is bordered by the Porto District to the north, ...

, João Mário began at hometown club A.D. Sanjoanense before joining the ranks of

FC Porto Futebol Clube do Porto, Order of Prince Henry, MHIH, Order of Merit (Portugal), 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 association footbal ...

at the age of 9. On 7 October 2018, while still a junior, he made his professional debut with the

reserve team In sports, a reserve team is a team composed of players who are under contract to a club but who do not regularly play in matches for the club's primary team. Reserve teams usually include players who are part of the larger first-team squad but ...

in a

LigaPro The Liga Portugal 2 (), also known as Liga Portugal Meu Super for sponsorship reasons, is the second-highest division of the Portuguese football league system. At the end of each season, the two top-finishing teams are promoted to the top-tier ...

match against F.C. Arouca, coming on for Tiago Matos for the last 11 minutes of a 1–0 home loss. The following 5 January, he scored his first goal in a 2–2 draw with S.L. Benfica B also at the Estádio Dr. Jorge Sampaio. On 10 June 2020, João Mário had his first call-up to Porto's first team, remaining unused as they won 1–0 at home to C.S. Marítimo. He debuted on 15 July as they won the

title with a 2–0 win over

Sporting CP Sporting Clube de Portugal (), otherwise referred to as Sporting CP or simply Sporting (particularly within Portugal), or as Sporting Lisbon in other countries,

also at the

Estádio do Dragão The Estádio do Dragão (; ') 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. Designed by Portugue ...

, playing the last five minutes in place of Luis Díaz. On 1 August he was on the bench in the 2–1 defeat of S.L. Benfica in the final of the

Taça de Portugal The Taça de Portugal (; ) is an annual association football competition and the premier knockout tournament in Portuguese football. For sponsorship reasons, it has been known as Taça de Portugal Generali Tranquilidade since the 2024–25 seaso ...

, securing a

double Double, The Double or Dubble may refer to: Mathematics and computing * Multiplication by 2 * Double precision, a floating-point representation of numbers that is typically 64 bits in length * A double number of the form x+yj, where j^2=+1 * A ...

. João Mário was eventually reconverted by manager

Sérgio Conceição Sérgio Paulo Marceneiro da Conceição (; born 15 November 1974) is a Portuguese professional football manager and former player who mostly played as a right winger. Throughout his career, he played for ten teams in five countries. After gain ...

into a

International career

João Mário won his first

cap A cap is a flat headgear, usually with a visor. Caps have crowns that fit very close to the head. They made their first appearance as early as 3200 BC. The origin of the word "cap" comes from the Old French word "chapeau" which means "head co ...

for Portugal at under-21 level on 4 September 2020, and scored in the 4–0 away victory against

Cyprus Cyprus (), officially the Republic of Cyprus, is an island country in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. Situated in West Asia, its cultural identity and geopolitical orientation are overwhelmingly Southeast European. Cyprus is the List of isl ...

for the 2021 UEFA European Championship qualifiers. On 13 November 2023, João Mário was called up by the senior team for the first time, replacing

Diogo Dalot José Diogo Dalot Teixeira (; born 18 March 1999) is a Portuguese professional Association football, footballer who plays as a Defender (association football)#Full-back, full back for club Manchester United F.C., Manchester United and the Port ...

(who withdrew for personal reasons) in the squad that would face

Liechtenstein Liechtenstein (, ; ; ), officially the Principality of Liechtenstein ( ), is a Landlocked country#Doubly landlocked, doubly landlocked Swiss Standard German, German-speaking microstate in the Central European Alps, between Austria in the east ...

and

Iceland Iceland is a Nordic countries, Nordic island country between the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic and Arctic Oceans, on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge between North America and Europe. It is culturally and politically linked with Europe and is the regi ...

UEFA Euro 2024 The 2024 UEFA European Football Championship, commonly referred to as UEFA Euro 2024 (stylised as UEFA EURO 2024) or simply Euro 2024, was the 17th UEFA European Championship, the quadrennial international Association football, football champ ...

qualifying matches. Three days later, he made his debut by replacing João Cancelo late into a 2–0 away win over the former. He made his first start on the 19th, in a 2–0 defeat of the latter at the

Estádio José Alvalade The Estádio José Alvalade (; ') is a Football (soccer), football stadium in Lisbon, Portugal, home of Sporting Clube de Portugal. It was built adjacent to the site of the Estádio José Alvalade (1956), older stadium. The stadium is named afte ...

Career statistics

Club

Honours

Porto Youth *

UEFA Youth League The UEFA Youth League is an annual club football competition organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) since 2013. In its current format, it is contested by the under-19 teams of the clubs competing in the UEFA Champions Le ...

: 2018–19 Porto *

: 2019–20, 2021–22 *

: 2019–20, 2021–22, 2022–23, 2023–24 *

Taça da Liga The Taça da Liga (), known outside Portugal as Portuguese League Cup, is an annual club football competition organised by the Liga Portuguesa de Futebol Profissional (LPFP) for teams competing in the top two tiers of Portuguese football – the ...

: 2022–23 *

Supertaça Cândido de Oliveira The Supertaça Cândido de Oliveira (; English: Cândido de Oliveira Super Cup, or simply Portuguese Super Cup) is an annual Portuguese association football, football match played since 1979 between the winners of the top-tier league (Primeira L ...

2020 The year 2020 was heavily defined by the COVID-19 pandemic, which led to global Social impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, social and Economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, economic disruption, mass cancellations and postponements of even ...

2022 The year began with another wave in the COVID-19 pandemic, with SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant, Omicron spreading rapidly and becoming the dominant variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus worldwide. Tracking a decrease in cases and deaths, 2022 saw ...

2024 The year saw the list of ongoing armed conflicts, continuation of major armed conflicts, including the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Myanmar civil war (2021–present), Myanmar civil war, the Sudanese civil war (2023–present), Sudane ...

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Joao Mario 2000 births Living people Footballers from São João da Madeira 21st-century Portuguese sportsmen Portuguese men's footballers Men's association football fullbacks Men's association football wingers Primeira Liga players Liga Portugal 2 players Padroense F.C. players FC Porto B players FC Porto players Portugal men's youth international footballers Portugal men's under-21 international footballers Portugal men's international footballers