Arsenal loanee Jakub Kiwior celebrated winning the Portuguese league title on Saturday, playing 45 minutes of their title-winning result against Alverca.
Arsenal loanee Jakub Kiwior has spent the 2025/26 campaign so far on loan with FC Porto, with an option to buy in his contract that makes it almost certain that he’ll remain with the Portuguese club beyond this season.
The centre-back has been a regular in the Porto side throughout the campaign, only missing a couple of games through injury, and on Saturday he was named in the starting lineup as his loan club had the chance to win the league against Alverca.
With Benfica drawing earlier in the day, Porto knew they only needed a point to guarantee the title, but they ended up securing all three in a 1-0 victory.
The title represents the first league success of Kiwior’s senior career, and the second piece of silverware – after winning the FA Community Shield with Arsenal in 2023.
It wasn’t an entirely positive day for the defender though. After picking up a yellow card in the 38th minute and then getting very fortunate the referee missed a second yellow in the 44th, he was substituted at half-time.
A red card before the break could very easily have spoiled the party, but Kiwior got lucky, and it was all but forgotten by the full-time whistle.
Porto will be very pleased to have wrestled the league title back from Sporting CP, who won it back-to-back during Viktor Gyokeres’ two seasons at the club.
They’ll be more disappointed with their performances in other competitions, having gone out of the Allianz Cup to Vitoria Guimaraes, suffered a 1-0 aggregate elimination from the Taca de Portugal by Sporting, and a 2-1 aggregate elimination from the Europa League by Nottingham Forest.
Reaching the semis of the foremost Portuguese domestic cup and the quarters of the Europa League, only to be eliminated by one goal in both cases, is certainly a shame for the team. But now is the time to put that behind them and enjoy their title celebrations.
Porto face two further league games before beginning their summer holidays, and with Poland missing out on the World Cup, Kiwior’s focus will then be on making his loan transfer permanent.
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