It’s been a while since we last saw our Sailors in action. More than 2 weeks ago, we managed to come away with a win in Hong Kong that reinvigorated our slim hopes of making it to the latter rounds of the AFC Champions League. While us supporters have had a chance to really kick back, relax, and bask in the warm glow of the away win, the players have not had such a luxury. Do we rotate and give us the best chance in Korea, or do we try our best to effectively sew up qualification in the Singapore Cup so the last game takes on less significance?
4 Games in 17 Days
Of the 25 Lions called up to play the two matches against Guam, 10 were from the Sailors, and 9 featured. The only player who did not see any gametime was Zharfan.
This has been a hectic time for these players. Let’s take a look at their schedule since the Kitchee game.
4 October – Kitchee v Sailors
12 October – Singapore v Guam
17 October – Guam v Singapore
21 October – Sailors v Tanjong Pagar
Should our national team players feature again, it might be a case of 4 games in 17 days, along with 4 flights as well. That is a tiring schedule, especially taking into account he 13h journeys by air to and from Guam. The likes of Anu, Lionel, CvH, Mamat, Hariss, and Shawal saw significant gametime, and I do wonder if there is some temptation to give a rest to a few of them.
However, given the injury and unavailability issues faced by the Sailors, it may not be feasible to rest all of them. One of the key figures that might dictate if people like Anu and Lionel may play is Bailey Wright. He has been out since early-September when he picked up an injury in a closed-door friendly against Albirex. Given that Anu, Lionel, and Hariss played many minutes against Guam and Kitchee, and Bailey hasn’t played at all, it would be ideal to let Bailey play – if he is fit.
Is Bailey Fit? Plus Other Injury News
Bailey Wright
It’s really tough to say. Unlike Singapore’s favourite league, the English Premier League, injury news is very hard to come by as local clubs are often tight-lipped about player injuries and how serious they are. We are thus left to guess based on club training videos – a skill picked up through years of playing Fantasy Football (FF). For those unacquainted, FF is an online game where people pick players from various Premier League teams and sort them into a lineup of 11 players, and these said players then pick up virtual points based on their real-life performances in matches. FF is also a game taken way too seriously by people like myself, which thus results in crazy, irrational behaviour, such as looking for the littlest clues in training videos as to whether a player we picked is injured and will feature at the weekend.
So, if you look at the training video below, scroll to around 2:30 and watch on for 10 seconds – you will see that Bailey Wright has resumed pitch training, and crucially, resumed pitch training in a group. However, of course, it must be said that that was a rondo/monkey training drill, which may not involve as much rigour as other drills which were not really shown. Nothing in the video shows Bailey doing anything that would really extend him as well, so it is hard to say if he will feature tomorrow. I guess we’ll see.
If you don’t see Bailey, it’s cos his back is turned to the camera. Haha I am a psycho.
Same applies for Pedro Henrique. While he cannot play tomorrow because he is not registered in our Singapore Cup squad, Coach Rankovic may be tempted to push one or two of Lionel/Anu/Hariss for the full 90 if he felt that Pedro Henrique was fit and ready to start against Jeonbuk on Wednesday.
Kodai Tanaka
This one’s not entirely relevant for tomorrow’s game but I just thought I’d comment on it. Kodai was injured on 9 March against Albirex. However, it was not until around the end of the month before he had his surgery. This can be seen from his post on 1 April, where he said he had his surgery two days prior.
This is normal for ACL injuries – you cannot operate immediately. According to Dr. Andy Williams, an ACL reconstruction expert, you need to let the swelling go down and for the knee to go “quiet”, if not you risk adding to the trauma and in the long term, you may stiffen up the knee even more.
So from 1 April till now, that’s about 6.5 months. You have seen from Kodai’s instagram posts that he has resumed training for quite a while already. While at first it was just solitary gym work, he has returned to the pitch to do solo training, and now he’s back in group training. As to the extent of how intense his training is, we can only guess from his posts and the training video above – but 6-9 mths is the usual timeframe.
If you scroll to 4:31 – you will see that in a small-sided game, he comes sliding in to intercept a pass. To me, even though I am not an expert, I think this is a heartening sign. We definitely won’t see him against Tanjong Pagar, but maybe he’ll make it for the Jeonbuk game as a substitute? Let’s see if he travels with the team.
It doesn’t seem like there’s any other injury news, so if Ranko is trying to more or less secure qualification tomorrow, this is perhaps a good chance to do it.
Going for a Win to Secure Qualification
A win will almost certainly put us into the semifinals. It is not mathematically confirmed of course, but let me explain with reference to the table.
Tomorrow’s clash sees the two teams with 3 points battle it out. Should we win, we go to 6 points, and stay top. If Hougang and Balestier draw, then we would have already sealed qualification.
If there is a winner in the Hougang-Balestier game, then the winner of that game will be on 3 points. However, unless it is a huge win, then our goal difference is likely to be very hard to overcome, and so regardless of the result in our last game, it would be improbable for us to drop out of the top 2.
Long story short, win and we should progress. We can then really put out an experimental lineup for our last Cup game against Hougang, resting players before what could be a crucial away game against Bangkok United.
Finishing top of our group also is unlikely to be vital, considering the mayhem going on in Group A. Usually you’d want to avoid Albirex, but if you take a look at their table, amazingly Albirex is far more likely to finish 2nd, rather than 1st. I think whatever opponent comes out of the draw, we’d fancy our chances, so qualification should be the priority, and winning tomorrow gives us an amazing chance to accomplish it.
Let’s take a look at our results against TPU this season.
Form Book
We have beaten them thrice this season – 3-1, 7-1, and most recently, 3-2. The 7-1 aside, it wasn’t all easy.
Those with a good memory will remember that the 3-1 game was right at the start of the season, and it wasn’t till very late in the game that we managed to seal it through a Kodai Tanaka goal. Tanjong Pagar also missed a penalty in the second half which would have levelled up the scores.
As for the 3-2? It was the late, late show, as we somehow went down 2-1 in a game we dominated from start to finish, but managed to win 3-2 with a Lestienne penalty in the 81st min, and a Shawal header in the 85th.
The 7-1 game was a stroll in the park, but let’s not forget that TPU did not have the services of Shakir Hamzah and Blake Ricciuto, who both missed the game through suspension. That is half their attack gone.
Between them, you can see that they have notched up 8 goals and 5 assists. They will be available this time round.
Add to that the resurgent form of Pedro Dias, who finally seems to have shaken off his injury woes, and Marin Mudrazija, who finally seems to have shaken off his poor form – and then top it off with the fact that TPUFC is on a 3-match unbeaten run, a win should not be taken for granted.
Congrats to Zharfan
Last but not least, Zharfan faces his former club in this one. Let’s hope he gets a clean sheet to go along with the fantastic news that he just got engaged!
WOO CONGRATS ZHARFAN!
Conclusion
It’s very hard to predict the outcome of a game where we do not know whether there will be alot of rotation in anticipation of our upcoming ACL game against Jeonbuk. Ideally, we will be able to get ourselves a good 2 goal advantage at the break, and then start bringing off players, giving minutes to the likes of Asis and Nathan.
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: Sailors 2 TPU 0
Joseph’s prediction: Sailors 3 TPU 1
And here’s the leaderboard –
Written by Eddy Hirono
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