Sporting Clube Ideal

Ideal's first kit crossed the Atlantic by boat: it came from the United States, sent by an emigrant, José Morgado Teves, to dress the pioneering group that got Ribeira Grande playing football with players changing in an office on Rua do Passal. From that embryo was born, on 2 February 1931, Sporting Clube Ideal, branch number 132 of Sporting CP, today the oldest active club in the municipality and the city's flagbearer. The crest is the whole of Ribeira Grande in four quarters: the Alvalade lion, the star of the patron saint Nossa Senhora da Estrela, the city's historic bridge and the ball that binds it all. A giant of São Miguel football, in the 2010s it was the best supported club on the island, won the Azores Series in 2014/15 and lived seven straight seasons in the national championships, until 2022, always from the Municipal Stadium and its 2500 souls. Ninety odd years after the shirt that came from America, the lesson holds: on the islands, football has always known how to travel.