Two thirds of Portugal's top flight go into the season aiming for what they call 'manutencao'.

The literal translation is 'maintenance' although in football it means what we in England typically refer to as survival. To cling on for one more year and to bank another windfall.

When Ian Cathro took the job at Estoril last summer, he banned the word. Like Brad Pitt and the first rule of Fight Club (don't talk about Fight Club) he did not see the sense in fighting all season in the hope of avoiding the drop to collapse on the floor in relief.

The stance, he accepts, invited its own complications. Estoril, with their humble budget and crowds of around 3,000, are not going to become champions and he would need some targets, so he set out different ones.

'We needed to develop a compassion and love for getting better,' Cathro says. 'To build a different version of Estoril that doesn't start the season panicking to stay up. One that doesn't live with the constant stress. One that is stable. One that is fearless. One that just goes for it and doesn't play scared.

'All of that was part of a package that started with, 'Don't talk about manutencao'. And that's been the story of our approach to the season.'

In eight games since Christmas, Estoril have won six and drawn two. They are eighth and Cathro has been voted manager of the month after five wins in a row, the club's best top-flight winning run since 1949. It is a small token of reward for his endeavour, courage and determination to do things differently.

And on Monday night he will take his team to the home of champions Sporting.

At 38, he has completed a circle to Portuguese football since leaving his role as the head of Dundee United's academy to join Nuno Espirito Santo's coaching team at Rio Ave in 2012. From there, his career took him to Spain and England and Scotland, back to England and Saudi Arabia. Much, but not all, of that journey has been in tandem with Nuno.

The pair met as aspiring coaches taking the UEFA B qualification in Largs, Scotland, with an instant rapport and shared vision of the game.

Cathro does not hesitate to accept Nuno has been a mentor. 'The single most important figure in my story,' as he puts it, and for him it is no surprise to see Nuno thriving at Nottingham Forest. 'He leads, organises, builds a connected way of thinking, playing, working and puts a group together to really compete in a way that is genuinely about the team over everything.

'Obviously, everybody says that in every meeting in every changing room in every stadium in the world, but saying it and achieving it are very different things. He excels at that. And it's proven. Look at his career and understand context, and every time he has been fully supported, he has only been successful.'

When Cathro decided it was time to relaunch his own managerial career, Estoril seemed a perfect fit. He is fluent in Portuguese and familiar with the culture of the nation and its football from his time at Rio Ave and travels with Nuno.

It is already proving a better fit than Hearts, where his tenure as head coach lasted less than eight months, ending in August 2017, and served to convince him more than anything that his future career would likely be spent away from his native Scotland.

'I look forward to the day when somebody in Britain doesn't refer to me as the ex-Hearts coach,' he smiles wryly. 'That will die out, but it might as well die out now.

'The things that happened, happened. And in my mind, this is the start of my career as a head coach. Estoril is my first club. I already feel a bigger connection to it and with the players and people I work with than I did in any previous false start, if you want to call it that.'

Cathro admires the coaching odysseys of Sir Bobby Robson and Roy Hodgson, and on a multi-national quest of his own, exploring and acquiring knowledge will appeal to his curious mind.

But for now, he appreciates Portugal's Primeira Liga is a hothouse environment for ambitious young coaches. He is one of only two non-Portuguese in a league of 18 and one of only four still in the job they were in at the start of the season.

Success is not easy. There is no centralised broadcasting deal and the big three of Benfica, Sporting and Porto dominate with Braga not far behind. There is, however, an abundance of young talent to work with and the pressure of elite competition to make it attractive.

'Maybe all those things create a breeding ground for coaches to grow and develop,' says Cathro. 'You don't come here and put your slippers on, that just doesn't work.'