Sporting Lisbon Trivia Quiz

Answer: Sporting Clube de Portugal

The football team Sporting Clube de Portugal is generally known in Portugal as simply 'Sporting'. The name Sporting Lisbon is not really correct, but is commonly used outside of Portugal as it has the handy benefit of telling foreign football supporters which city they would need to travel to in order to watch the team play.

Sporting (Lisbon) may be the most famous part of the Sporting Clube de Portugal but they actually make up only a small proportion of it. The club also runs teams in numerous other sports, including athletics, cycling, rugby and table tennis. The incorrect options are all football teams based in Lisbon. Sport Lisboa e Benfica is probably the best known of them - under the shortened name Benfica.

Answer: Vanessa Fernandes

Vanessa Fernandes won the European Triathlon Championships every year from 2004 to 2008 and then took the bronze medal in 2009. She also had success on the world stage, winning the triathlon world cup in 2006 and 2007, the world championships in 2007 and taking Olympic silver at the 2008 Games held in Beijing.

In addition to competing in the triathlon - which consists of swimming, cycling and running - Fernandes was also a double world champion in duathlon in 2007 and 2008. This lesser known version of the sport involves substituting the swimming leg with an additional 10 km run.

The incorrect options are all noted Portuguese long distance runners.

Answer: Judo

It was the European Judo Championships that were held at Pavilhão Atlântico in Lisbon in 2008. The building was constructed for Expo '98 and was known as the MEO Arena for several years before having its named changed to the Altice Arena in 2017. Portugal's home gold medallist was João Neto in the men's half-middleweight (81kg) event, while the bronze medals came in the men's half-lightweight (66kg), women's extra-lightweight (48kg) and women's half-heavyweight (78kg) competitions.

However, despite this European success, Portugal did not win any judo medals at the Beijing Olympics, which took place just a few months later. João Neto competed but was eliminated at the quarter-final stage by the South Korean judoka who went on to win silver.

Answer: Argentina A

The World Rugby Nations Cup should not be confused with the Rugby World Cup (which dates back to 1987) as it is a tournament designed for lower-ranked nations and the second-string teams from top rugby union-playing countries. The first edition of the tournament featured only four teams in a group-stage format, where each team played each other once and the team with the most points was declared the winner. In other years, six teams have taken part and the format of the tournament has also changed as the competition developed.

The inaugural competition took place between the second (or 'A') teams from Argentina and Italy as well as Russia and the host nation, Portugal. Argentina A won the cup convincingly with a score of 14 points compared to the seven scored by both Italy A and Russia. Portugal managed to score three points and finished in fourth (last) place.

Answer: Dakar Rally

The Dakar Rally - originally known as the Paris-Dakar Rally - is an annual long-distance off-road motor racing event that was first held in 1978 and covered a course from Paris, the capital of France, to Dakar, the capital of Senegal in West Africa. The first edition of the event to start outside Paris was the 1995 race, which started from the Spanish city of Granada. Lisbon hosted the start of the rally in both 2006 and 2007 before the event was cancelled in 2008 over safety concerns following terrorist attacks near the race's route through Mauritania. "The Dakar" reappeared on the calendar in 2009 but was held entirely in South America - thousands of miles away from the place it was named after.

The Tour de France is a cycle race, the Clipper Round the World Yacht race is a sailing event and the Tevis Cup is an American long-distance horse race.

Answer: Real Madrid

The 2014 UEFA Champions' League Final was held at the Estádio da Luz, the home of the Lisbon club Benfica, and featured two clubs from the capital of the neighbouring country of Spain - Real Madrid and Atlético Madrid. This made it the first time that the final of this competition had been contested by two teams from the same city. Atlético Madrid held a 1-0 lead through the majority of the match and looked on course to lift the trophy for the first time in their history. However, Real Madrid scored an equaliser in stoppage time and then went on to defeat them 4-1 by the end of extra time, securing their tenth Champions' League (or equivalent) title in the process.

Bayern Munich of Germany and England's Chelsea were the two defeated semi-finalists.

Answer: Volvo Ocean Race

The Volvo Ocean Race (formerly known as the Whitbread Round the World Race) is a sailing event that consists of a series of long-distance stages between ports around the world, as well as shorter races held in the waters around those ports. A total of seven yachts competed in the 2017-18 edition, whose first leg was a race from Alicante in southern Spain to Lisbon on Portugal's Atlantic coast in November 2017.

The yachts then had an "in-port" race in Lisbon before departing on a much-longer leg to Cape Town in South Africa.

The race then visited Australia, Hong Kong, China, New Zealand, Brazil, the USA, Wales and Sweden before finishing in the Netherlands in June 2018. The event was won by a Chinese yacht, Dongfeng, which was skippered by the French sailor, Charles Caudrelier.

Answer: Croatia and Germany

Handball, as played at the Olympic Games and world championship events, is an indoor team sport where players throw a ball to each other with the aim of eventually managing to throw it into the opposing team's goal. Teams are made of up seven players (including a goalkeeper) and the team with the most goals at the end of a one hour match are declared the winners. The sport has some resemblance to both basketball and netball, but the goal looks more like that used in hockey or football. The men's event made its competitive Olympic debut in Munich in 1972 and the women's event followed at the 1976 Games in Montreal.

The handball final at the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens was contested between Croatia and Germany, a match which Croatia won by 26 goals to 24. The only difference between this match and the final of the 2003 world championships in Lisbon was the score line - in the latter Croatia beat Germany by 34 goals to 31.

The incorrect options were the Olympic handball finalists from the Games held in 2008, 2012 and 2016.

Answer: 1500 metres

Rui Silva competed for Portugal in various middle and long distance running events, but had most of his success in the 1500 metres. Over that distance he was a four-time gold medallist at the European Indoor Championships between 1998 and 2009 and also won the World Indoor Championships in 2001, when it was held in Lisbon. He also took the bronze medal at the (outdoor) 2004 Olympic Games and 2005 World Championships.

At the World Indoor Championships, the 60 metres sprint event is contested instead of the usual outdoor distance of 100 metres and the men compete in the heptathlon rather than the decathlon. The javelin is not included on the programme for these championships because participants tend to throw it further than the space available in an indoor arena!

Answer: Greece

Home nations have a tradition of doing quite well in international football tournaments (the 1930, 1934, 1966, 1974, 1978 and 1998 World Cups were all won by the home team), so it shouldn't have been any great surprise when Portugal reached the final of the Euro 2004 tournament when it was held in their own country. The final was a repeat of the opening match of the tournament, as Greece had also been Portugal's first opponents in Group A. The group match between the sides was won 2-1 by Greece and they also won the second encounter by a similar margin (1-0). The result was a bit of a shock, as going into the tournament Greece had been ranked 23rd by UEFA (the European football governing body) while Portugal had been ranked 2nd - so clearly rankings aren't always a good indicator of outcome!

The Netherlands and the Czech Republic were the two defeated semi-finalists.