Believe it or not, if the pandemic doesn’t explode again, we’re just over 60 days away from the beginning of the WSL’s 2021 season, which will start with a bang at Pipeline in December. The latest stop in pre-season shredding was the MEO Portugal Cup, held in the surf town of Ericeira over the past few days. Finals day was today, and although there weren’t many spectators, that didn’t mean it wasn’t eventful, culminating with an exciting final this evening in Portugal (mid morning for those of us on the U.S. West Coast) featuring Portugal’s Frederico Morais and the reigning champ himself Italo Ferreira.
Photo: WSL
On the women’s side the story was all about Johanne Defay, who continued to dominate after putting on an impressive show for her home crowd at the French Rendez-Vous last week. Today saw her defeat Portugal’s Carolina Mendes in the quarterfinals, easily take down Anat Lelior in the semis, and defeat Nadia Erostarbe of the Basque Country in the finals. The two competition wins earned her the 2020 Euro Cup title, and some down time, which she plans to spend in and around Ericeira, surfing and living the van life with her boyfriend.
As far as projections went for the men’s side, both Morais and Ferreira were strong favorites despite a stacked field that included Kanoa Igarashi and Vasco Ribeiro, ranked 6th and 11th respectively. Ferreira was the man to beat in the yellow Jeep leader’s jersey – especially after his recent win in France – but Morais put down strong scores in the quarters with a pair of eights against Aritz Aranburu and proved his determination with a down-to-the-wire performance against Igarashi where both surfers dropped their best two scores in the last fifteen minutes.
Photo: WSL
In the final, Morais showed he was certainly at home at his local beach reef/point/beach break of Ribeira D’Ilhas, starting with a 6.5 on his first wave. Ferreira, despite coming off of a win at the French Rendez-Vous and going on an explosive tear through the elimination, quarters and semi rounds was relatively out of sorts to start the final heat against Morais, but came through with a couple of late scores that almost saw him catch up. In the end, his second place finish did earn him the 2020 Euro Cup title, but that’s likely to be a poor consolation prize to a man who hasn’t lost a competition since last December. Next up: the Australian Boost Mobile Pro Gold Coast, which has Australia’s best ready and waiting to get down to business.
