December 15, 2023

As I took the Grab to the stadium for this game (didn’t drive because I knew there would definitely be drinks after), I have to be honest – my thoughts weren’t about how exciting this Champions League game was. It wasn’t about how our Sailors could potentially win and achieve a 9-point finish which would have seen them go down in history as the best Singaporean team. The dominant thought in my head was simply – “Finally, the season is ending”. And I suspect that might have been the feeling for some of our players and staff as well. I don’t mean that in a harsh way by the way – it’s just human nature I guess. Let’s dive right into some of my post-match thoughts. Nothing to Fight For You’ve seen it before in the English Premier League and any other league involving relegation. For one whole year, there are teams that fly high in the league, playing swashbuckling attacking football and taking on all comers. At the end of the season though – they’ve sewn up 2nd spot or 3rd spot or 4th spot or whatever they needed to sew up, and suddenly they come up against teams fighting against relegation. And they look like a completely different team. That’s what our Sailors looked like on Wednesday. In our Champions League campaign, we’ve seen us being defensively quite solid in our 5-at-the-back formation. It probably came at the expense of some attacking creativity up front, but I would never say we looked ragged at the back. We looked very ragged at the back in this game though. I don’t quite know what it was, but I felt the whole game we looked lethargic and in attack, just couldn’t find that little bit extra to break down our opponents. In defence, I think we were not helped by Anu not being on the pitch, as we failed to close down our opponents as quickly as I think we should have. In the first 10 minutes Kitchee already had 3 shots on target. Zharfan did well to keep the score at 0-0, and we really should have heeded our warnings, but unfortunately, in the 11th minute, Chris van Huizen scored the best header he will ever score. The Crucial First Goal At the wrong end. All I can say is “shit happens” for Chris’s contribution to this calamitous own goal. However, the goal isn’t only his fault. If you watch replays of the goal, Hariss fails to track his man in midfield, allowing Fernando to play a 1-2 with him on the wing. Mamat also fails to see what’s unfolding in front of his eyes, and allows Fernando past him on the wing to whip in a cross. Of course, the cross still needed finishing, and Chris will never score an own goal like that ever again. A bullet header into the top corner which gave Zharfan no chance. Sloppy all-round even before Chris’s meaningful touch. Shit happens. Unfortunately, in this case, when shit happens in a dead rubber game where the opposition is looking to gain their first points in the group and regain some pride, it meant that we lacked the necessary grit to overcome a Kitchee team that could now sit back in numbers and pick and choose their moments to attack us. Time and again, when we lost the ball, they launched a quick counter-attack and looked dangerous. We never really looked like scoring, and even when we came close to the goal, we found the Kitchee second-choice keeper to be an obstacle. It seemed pretty clear to me that we were not gonna score all night. The Killer Second Goal It kinda hurts to continue talking about this game. But OK the article needs to be written, so I shall plug on. I think for this one, Hariss puts some pressure on Fernando, but Bailey should have stepped up and backed his ability to not let Fernando past him. Being a defender myself, I know why he sat back – he probably felt Hariss was putting enough pressure on Fernando, he probably felt that if he sat off a bit, Fernando can’t dribble past him, and he probably felt that his body shape and the area he was covering did not allow Fernando to shoot past him. Unfortunately, Fernando took a shot through his legs, and it was on target. Zharfan must have seen it quite late as well. A very soft goal to concede, just when it looked like we were putting some pressure on Kitchee. Failure to Create History I think it is slightly disappointing that we did not manage to get to 7 or 9 points from this Champions League campaign. The reason I say that is not because I really care for this record. I just think that the way we played this season in the AFC Champions League was way more impressive than last season – so it seems a pity that we were not able to at least have a tangible record to hold on to. Instead, all we have are memories of these good performances. Why do I feel this season’s 6 points is better than last season’s 7 points? Here’s some reasons – So I feel like our failure to at least match the 7 points by gaining a draw against Kitchee at home is kinda disappointing. I am convinced though, that if this match wasn’t a dead rubber match, we would no doubt have got that equaliser or winner. I will take a “glass is half-full” approach to assessing our Champions League campaign – hopefully the team will have learnt some lessons which they can apply in ACL2 next year. The Return of Wookie I am so proud of our fans for giving Wookie the welcome he deserves. The online discourse surrounding Kim Shin-Wook is divided to say the least. It sometimes gets really toxic, with people calling him a flop. Imagine calling the 3rd