[Preview] Young Lions v Sailors – Sailors Must Navigate the Complacen-sea

Complacency is the buzzword for this article, and for our match against Young Lions tomorrow. It’s featured in the title of our preview here, and also features heavily in the official Sailors preview (the word “complacency” is used thrice in its various forms).

Sailors are Overwhelming Favourites

There is good reason for the choice of the word “complacency” – Young Lions should not have any chance of winning this game. Coming into this game, here are some relevant stats :

• Have lost their last seven games – the last time they avoided defeat was 15 April, against us (sigh).
• Young Lions have only won once this season, against Hougang United.
• Young Lions have now conceded in each of their last 79 matches since September 2019 (credit to spl.sg for this stat).
• Young Lions’ tally of 46 goals conceded in the league is the second-worst, the only worse defence is Balestier Khalsa’s, which has conceded 47 goals.
• Young Lions have scored the fewest goals, taken the fewest shots, and recorded the fewest shots on target in the league.

On top of the above, they have also lost key players such as Jordan Emaviwe, and Jacob Mahler, who have gone to Balestier Khalsa and Madura United respectively. Jared Gallagher may be back in contention to start the game as his training stint with Sligo Rovers should have ended on 3 July. His addition will be a welcome one to Young Lions as his defensive abilities should help in the middle of the park as they will undoubtedly try to sit in a deep block to frustrate the Sailors.

There should thus be no excuse for our Sailors, provided we are not complacent, but let’s take a look at some factors to think about ahead of tomorrow’s game.

Farhan Zulkifli

Local fans have seen the fleet-footed left winger / wing-back for years now, and been entertained by his enterprising runs down the left flank, so much so that it is kinda surprising for me to learn that he is only 21 years old. It seems like he has been around forever. He made his debut 4 years ago, and has since gone on to be called up for national team squads and even made his debut last year.

He made his debut for the Young Lions against Albirex a few days ago, and he was electric. In the half hour that he was subbed on, he never stopped running and gave Albirex a really tough time. He completed all 4 dribbles that he attempted, he won a penalty, and with better finishing, might even have got a goal for himself.

He has pace to burn so Sailors fans can expect that between Syahadat Masnawi (another willing runner) and himself, they will be the ones running after long balls and clearances from their defenders to try to catch us on the counter-attack. One for the defence to worry about!

Rotation

This is a tricky question – should the Sailors try to rotate the squad a little? There are pros and cons to this approach. Given that Young Lions are the worst team in the league, the argument can be made that if not now, then when? We play Albirex on 16 July in a match that will definitely have a huge impact on the title race.

In the month of July, we have three games before 16 July.

• 1 July – Tanjong Pagar United
• 7 July – Young Lions
• 11 July – DPMM Brunei

In that same period, Albirex only have 2 games. Even then, Albirex saw fit to rotate against Young Lions. Seia Kunori (their top scorer) and Tadanari Lee did not start, while Kaisei Ogawa only played 45 minutes. The changes to the squad perhaps affected their performance on the day. While they still emerged as comfortable winners, I think many expected a more dominant performance, and perhaps a bigger scoreline. As it was, Young Lions managed to score 2 goals, and even contrived to miss a penalty kick.

If we rotate, are we confident of still getting a good performance? If we have a bit of a disjointed performance, can we still come out of the game with 3 points? These are questions that Coach Ranko has to grapple with. My opinion is that we definitely have to rotate. Even if we do not leave out our established starters from the outset, I think we have to be more daring when it comes to mid-game substitutions. If we are 2 goals up at half-time for example, dare we leave out Maxime Lestienne for the second half? I think we should. Let’s see our fringe players get some free time. We’re entering the final straight of the league campaign, and if there are any injuries, we will want our fringe players to at least have some match practice under their belt so that we can rely on them.

It would of course, be easier to rotate if our foreign signings are eligible to play – but for whatever reason, they have not been announced yet. Perhaps some work permit issues? Some other administrative issues that we are not privy to? It’s really hard to say.

Whatever it is, it is clear that Super and Bernie seem to have been deregistered from our SPL squad, as they were both not in the matchday squad against Tanjong Pagar United. I hope that the new foreign signings get to play soon, and if we’re lucky, maybe they’ll make it off the bench for a cameo?

Conclusion

Just win. Some supporters have talked about using this game to pad the goal difference stats. While I can see their point – I think it is still a little disrespectful to the Young Lions. These are still professional footballers, who put in a very decent shift against reigning champions Albirex. What I want to see is a continuation of our dominance against Tanjong Pagar and Hougang – the scoreline will naturallly follow. As long as we are not complacent.

COME ON YOU BOYS IN BLUE!

Score Prediction

Joseph and I predict the scores and track our success in a table. Stay tuned to find out who is the prediction king!

3 points for exact scoreline predicted correctly, 2 points for predicting the winner and margin of victory correctly (but not the exact scoreline), and 1 point for predicting the outcome correctly (win, lose or draw).

Eddy’s prediction: YL 0 LCS 6

Joseph’s prediction: YL 2 LCS 5

And here’s the leaderboard –

Written by Eddy Hirono

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