Following her winning start in Portugal, the 31-year-old winger has opened up on the exciting opportunity to continue her professional career in Europe. The move means a lot to me. Previously I played in Sweden and I had the option to renew my contract but the offer was not what I wanted, Smeda told
Goal. So I waited for something else [new offer] to come up during the summer and then this move happened. I am happy and grateful for this opportunity. I think the offer came out of the blue. My agent reached out to me on a fateful day that the team is interested and asked if I was interested. I said yes.
Having finished the first round on top, the newly-promoted side continued from where they left off on a high as Solange Carvalhas gave the visitors the lead after just 21 minutes of action.
A minute from the break, the unbeaten visitors maintained their push for more goals and found a breakthrough through Mariana Azevedo.
Three minutes after the restart, Famalicao extended their lead when Solange Carvalhas bagged her brace before the South African was introduced as a replacement for Maria Negrao.
Gil Vicente, however, fought in an attempt for a possible comeback but could only pull one back in the 71st minute through Lea Pires.
Commenting on her signing, the team s head coach Ollipekka Ojala told the club website: “Our manager Vesa Kauppila has done a lot of work in mapping the players and as a result of this work we attached a player to the team who with her strengths can make us even more dangerous in the attacking direction and bring more speed to our line of defence. We wanted a player who can also play a little higher when needed and who has the ability to lead a team within games. He comes from a high-level university team and already has some experience of playing in Europe, so we believe he will adapt quickly to our operating environment.