August 2024

Well, that was expected wasn’t it? As predicted in the preview, Tomoyuki Doi and Noor Ali would give us some trouble and a win was not going to be straightforward. There can be some regret this morning because even though I think we didn’t play well enough to deserve all 3 points, we were in a good position to take the 3 points after two moments of quality from the Bart-Maxime pair that led to two goals. On the bright side, Tampines also dropped points, unexpectedly to a resurgent Hougang team, so their lead doesn’t widen. We could have gone top of the table though! Let’s dive right into the post-match thoughts. Bart and Maxime Let’s start with the positives. Moments of quality from the pair of them, a goal and an assist each. Bart was pushed and bodied on the way to scoring his goal but managed to just keep his feet enough to poke the ball in past Rudy Khairullah – just brilliant. Maxime did Maxime things – a goal and an assist for him a just reward for his efforts yesterday. Oh, another positive, while I was away in Jordan, I could hear from the stream that the fans were really loud, and importantly, still having a lot of fun. Just amazing. Both Teams Sloppy Perhaps due to recent results, both teams seemed to lack any attacking fluency in the first half. Coach Ranko touched on this in the post-match interview, saying that the decision-making wasn’t the best sometimes when they were attacking Geylang and were presented with 4v4 opportunities or 4v3 opportunities. I’d go a bit further than that, I’d say not only was the decision-making sometimes poor, it was the execution as well, even if the decision was correct. How many times did we see what was seemingly an easy pass roll out for a throw-in, or be hit with so little pace such that the Geylang defender could intercept it easily? Thankfully for us, this disease seemed to hit Geylang too in the first half. That was a major contributing factor towards both teams’ disjointed performances and I can’t recall any shots of note in the first half. The second half got better and we created more chances, but unfortunately we failed to finish some of them. Is Finishing the Issue? Coach Ranko also touched on the finishing not being as good as we hoped for, indicating that had we been able to finish better, we would have won. I don’t necessarily agree that finishing is the issue. Did we really test Rudy Khairullah and Hairul Syirhan a lot? I don’t think so. Two occasions come to mind when we talk about better finishing. First, the Lennart Thy header off a fantastic Maxime cross – that was eventually saved by Hairul Syirhan expertly when he jumped into the air and made himself huge. Second, the Shawal Anuar chance when he had the whole goal to aim at but only succeeded in shooting at the Geylang defender on the line, with the goalkeeper taken out of the equation. Do we score these on another day? I’d say yes. We’ve been unlucky in a sense that for the past two games, the opposition goalkeeper has pulled off an insane save at a crucial point of the game. However, you can’t just blame luck. I’d say that the bigger problem is that we are not creating more clear-cut chances. Games like these happen – your opposing goalkeeper will suddenly have the best game of his life, your striker might miss a sitter, you might hit the post, the ball takes a weird bobble in front of goal, etc. A team like Sailors should be able to shake that off, and just go about creating the next chance, and the next, and the next. Is that too much to ask for? I don’t think so. I think with the calibre of players at our disposal, we should work out a system where we are doing it more consistently rather than just playing on the break, which we did for about 2/3 of the game yesterday. Is Lionel Tan the Issue? Lionel Tan is as much at fault for the defeat yesterday as Shawal Anuar and Lennart Thy, and arguably I’d say even Rui Pires. I know it’s a cliched statement, but you win and lose together as a team. Was it a rash challenge by Lionel, going in too fast and too strong and misjudging the situation? Yes, it undoubtedly was. But that’s one bad decision. How can a player be scapegoated for making one bad decision in a game which requires you to make hundreds of decisions over the course of 90min? I think as fans, we have a tendency to pick out easy targets. I am not immune to this as well. I tend to fixate on goalkeeper errors, or centreback errors more than those errors made further upfield. When a ball is passed from the centreback into midfield, and it’s underhit, I immediately blame the centreback. The crowd also shouts “HEY JUST CLEAR IT!” It’s natural, we don’t like danger, we don’t like the uncertainty that comes with it. In the example of build-up play, I’d say that there’s a larger picture in mind – certain risks have to be taken and when we all calm down and think about it, we realise that we can’t be clearing every ball. Sometimes, we need to take those risks to draw our opponents onto us, and create the space that we need to attack. But back to Lionel and his challenge. It was a poor decision, but in my opinion, no poorer than the many decisions made by his teammates over the course of 90min which led to us only having a 1-goal advantage. Song, for example, how many times did he give the ball away? I’ll dedicate a section to him. There are some worrying signs, in my opinion. Rui Pires – what I like

Oh dear… Oh dear… Oh dear… With the main man off exploring Jordan as the Women’s Team embark on their AFC Women’s Champions League debut, I’ve taken on the unfortunate task of reliving this match over and over again to bring you some post-match thoughts. If you read Eddy’s preview, you’d know we weren’t expecting another 7-1 hammering in our favour. But surely, most of us still thought we’d come away with a hard-fought win, or at most a draw. After all, Albirex have not been firing on all cylinders this season. Well, Eddy was right about it being anything but straightforward, and his 3-1 score prediction was spot on—just for the wrong team. Ouch. Squad Depth? We knew there’d be some rotation, and sure enough, Bailey Wright and Rui Pires made way for Hariss Harun and the returning Obren Kjlajic. Shawal also came in for Song, meaning we had a few changes from the side that started against Borneo FC Samarinda on Thursday night. But from the off, it didn’t look promising. The Sailors seemed all at sea in transition, giving Albirex far too much room and causing a few heart-in-mouth moments in our box. The team looked disjointed, with players having some rather animated discussions about who should be doing what defensively. Attacking-wise, no movement, no creativity—just flat. The team looked knackered, while Albirex came close to scoring several times. Obren, who was clearly struggling with fitness, had to be subbed off after just 30 minutes. He didn’t look his usual lively self as he headed back to the bench. Was this sub purely because of fitness? Tactical? We’ll never know. The fans were getting a bit antsy, and I can’t say I blame them. It’s been a tough week, and this performance felt like the result of weeks of minimal rotation and our first taste of fixture congestion in what’s turning into a marathon season. Some fans I spoke to reckon our squad depth might not be as deep as we thought. Chances Go Begging – A Familiar Tale The second half started more brightly. The movement was better, but we were still missing that creative spark. We came close to taking the lead—an Albirex goal-line clearance and a brilliant save from Hassan Sunny kept us out. But, as they say, football’s a game of fine margins—right before Albirex’s opener, it could have easily been 2-0 to us. In the post-match interview, Coach Ranko said it plainly: when you get those chances, you HAVE to put them away. We didn’t, and Albirex punished us, catching us on the break to go 1-0 up. The match stats surprised me, to be honest—despite the result, both sides were pretty evenly matched in possession, attempts, and shots on target. According to Sofascore, we posted an impressive 3.42 xG, a full point higher than Albirex’s. While that may make it sound like we did quite alright, obviously it’s the result that matters most – we just couldn’t finish our dinner on a night where we had the chance to go top of the table. Insult to Injury – Or Injury to Insult? As if the night couldn’t get any worse, Toni Datkovic took a nasty knock to the ribs after colliding with Hassan. Losing a key player like Sicario with important fixtures ahead is far from ideal. Here’s hoping Toni bounces back soon—we’re all rooting for you, Sicario! What Next? I’ve seen some fans and the usual suspects on social media throwing around some rather outlandish comments. There’s the usual, sack this coach, sack X player, etc. But surely it’s onwards and upwards from here, right? As fans, our job is to rally behind the team and give them the support they need to get back on track. The title race is far from over, so it’s definitely not all doom and gloom. (Shoutout to Eddy for that one!) This is the first time the lads have lost two games on the trot in over a year (back-to-back 3-1 defeats to DPMM and Albirex last season). But they’ve shown time and again that when they’re down, they’re never out. The team’s got work to do, and we fans can do better too. If we want to bring the domestic treble back to Bishan, we’ve got to do it together. Conclusion This wasn’t the easiest piece to write, but if there’s one positive to take from that disappointing night in Jurong, it’s the fans. What a turnout from The Crew for an away trip to the West—singing their hearts out right to the bitter end! So, 3-1 to Albirex—a familiar disappointment at Jurong East Stadium and probably a fair result. Credit to Albirex, who’ve found new life under their new management. But we’ll bounce back. Next up, it’s Geylang at home as we return to Bishan—and, hopefully, to winning ways. Friday can’t come soon enough! I’ve got faith in the players and the coaching staff to iron out the creases and bring this club back to where it belongs. With a string of continental fixtures on the horizon, it’s now or never to turn this season around. COME ON YOU SAILORS! Written by Calum Lim If you’d like to support the work we do here at SailorFanTalk, you may want to visit https://ko-fi.com/sailorfantalk and leave us a tip!

Expectedly, Coach Ranko started a strong team in our opening match for the Shopee Cup. Rather unexpectedly, our team seemed completely off as they struggled to adapt to a terrible pitch that was reminiscent of Toa Payoh Stadium on its worst days. However, in this short piece (I still haven’t packed for Jordan and I leave tonight), I will talk about some observations of mine and why I don’t feel we can say that the defeat only came because of the pitch or because of other factors such as poor refereeing. Terrible Pitch The pitch looked bad before the game, but it was only when it started did we see how bad it was. Both sides struggled with the ball, but of course our Sailors struggled with it even more. You could see it in the passing – gone was the usual zip in our passes, or any pretty passing patterns. Our players were underhitting or overhitting their passes, struggling to make sense of the pitch. There seemed to be a certain fear, a certain tentativeness, and our opponents seemed to cope much better with the pitch as the game went on (even if it did screw up a couple of their own attacks due to the unpredictable nature of the bounce of the ball when dribbling/passing). But I won’t go so far as to blame the pitch – I think as a team, we have to adapt better. First, this is not even Borneo FC’s home stadium – so we can’t even say they are much more familiar with the pitch than we are. They just adapted to it way better. Second, I think it is on the players and the management to see how they can prepare better for such games. The Shopee Cup takes us to different parts of Southeast Asia, with differing financial standards, and differing standards of facilities. Unlike the ACL last season where we travelled to Hong Kong and South Korea and played in world-class stadiums, the Shopee Cup will bring with it days like last night’s. Could the coaching team have arranged training sessions in Choa Chu Kang Stadium to try to prepare for such games? In Singapore, we’ve been somewhat spoilt with the predictable nature of artificial turf and also the nicely-manicured surfaces in our Mattar Road training centre. Our big-name players as well, will have been brought up in world-class academies. This is not something they will be used to – let’s learn from this and prepare better next time. Third, could the in-game tactics be tweaked to not just counter, but take advantage of this pitch? In this kind of game, you need to take advantage of the unpredictability, and avoid getting caught in build-up play. Shawal Anuar should have been brought on earlier. You avoid alot of the problems of getting caught in possession by going a little more direct, and Shawal is exactly the sort of player you want chasing down long diagonal passes. Just go back to an article on this website about 1.5 years ago – we wrote about how Shawal has a great first touch. But unlike the feted first touches of players like Iniesta and Berbatov where they kill the ball dead and then play it, Shawal is an expert in using his first touch to beat players by knocking it past them. I’ll let you read our analysis back then. All in all, a very disappointing failure to adapt to the conditions was one of the main factors that led to last night’s result. It’s still very early, so let’s learn from this. Not a Second Yellow Card Rui’s first yellow card was deserved. The second? If that’s a yellow card, everytime I shake hands with someone I should be sent to prison. Absolute nonsense. The slightest of contact left Berguinho rolling on the floor like a …. I don’t quite know what would do justice to this sentence. He rolled on the floor like a thing. Like a thing conceived after Neymar had a lovechild with a rolling pin. Anyway, there was barely any contact and it came a minute after Rui was shown the first yellow. Surely the referee could have given him a talking-to even if he felt it was a bad challenge? We weren’t playing that well and I wouldn’t dare say that had Rui stayed on the pitch, we would definitely have overcome the deficit and equalised or even won the game. But a bad decision is a bad decision, and the referee made a huge error here. Individual Errors – Team Responsibility I am quite annoyed by the constant chatter surrounding our defenders / midfielders after a defeat. It’s always sack this guy, replace that guy, bench this other guy. Rui made 2 big errors last night. The first was when he failed to track Gaucho at a setpiece, and he scored. We knew about their prowess from crosses and setpieces, so I think Rui should be very disappointed by what happened. He has his hands on Gaucho, then suddenly, without much happening at all, he inexplicably loses him and Gaucho scores – not the ideal way to open the game. The second is a little more unfortunate. A low cross is played in, and the idea is absolutely correct – instead of hammering it clear, Rui tries to play a pass around the corner for a very-free Hami Syahin. It would have undoubtedly led to a good counter-attack if the ball was used properly. I said in the preview article that Borneo FC is susceptible to the counter-attack, so who knows what would have happened if that pass came off. Alas, it didn’t. The ball took some unpredictable bounces on the turf, and Rui got it caught in between his feet. The son of Neymar and a rolling pin couldn’t believe his luck, and tucked it in with ease. Undoubtedly, these were his errors. And he deserves some criticism for them. But let’s not just

It’s been a really hectic time work-wise and also personally, so I will keep this short. It is not often that you say a 3-0 win is disappointing, but I felt this match was disappointing in how it could and should have been so many more. Don’t take it from me, take it from Lionel Tan, Coach Rankovic, and even the opposing coach. They all said that it could have been a lot worse. Both Joseph and I predicted big wins, and what we didn’t count on is an off-day from our attackers. Utter Dominance We had this to say in the preview. Amazingly, we managed to see a repeat, except this time we racked up 4.18 xG. In the first half alone, our Sailors managed to hit 18 shots, which included Maxime allowing Naumovski to make a save with a weak finish in front of goal, Song shooting straight at a defender with the goalkeeper out of the picture, Shawal Anuar failed to pull the trigger from near the penalty spot and countless other chances that really should have ended up in the back of the net. This theme continued in the second half. Maxime Lestienne even contrived to miss one on his favoured left foot right in front of goal. However, even on his off-day, he ended up with 2 assists. Insane. I’d say we are both lucky and unlucky. Unlucky that we didn’t score more, because Naumovski is just such a beast, but also lucky that it didn’t cost us in the end, except for the minor matter of goal difference. We are still 2 ahead of Tampines Rovers on that front, but 1 point behind. Hopefully this doesn’t come back to bite us in the ass at the end of the season. Thy Worth His Weight In Goals (And More) Even when he wasn’t scoring goals, we had always been singing praises of Lennart Thy. His unselfish runs open up space for his teammates, and even when he was going through a lean goalscoring spell, he never once acted like anything other than the perfect teammate. There was no demanding to take penalties off Maxime Lestienne, no shooting from impossible angles, and even though Maxime was reluctant to pass to him in the first few matches he played, when it came time for Lennart to pass to Max, he did so readily. Now he is onto six goals and three assists for the season, having started the season later than the rest of the league. That’s 9 goal contributions in 8 games, an impressive return. Even without his goals though, I’ve always lauded his hard work for the team, and let me just show you two examples of how he gives us a different dimension in build-up. Both times, the ball is with our centrebacks and Brunei DPMM tries to set a trap for our defenders. A slightly loose pass, or a pass to a player who has been designated pre-match to be the pressing trigger might then lead to a bit of panic for our Sailors. Lennart Thy’s aerial presence and workrate changes that for us though – after the above frames, Thy presented himself for an aerial challenge, and while one resulted in Sailors keeping possession and the other didn’t – they both eventually lead to similarly dangerous chances. Simply put, Lennart gives us a variety of build-up options which can help us break the press of our opponents. Upcoming Fixtures Post-match, Coach Rankovic appealed to the FAS to allow Singapore’s continental representatives to have more rest in between league fixtures and continental fixtures. If you look at the fixtures, you can see why. A match on Thursday night away from home, followed by a game on Sunday against a resurgent Albirex sounds like a potential banana peel. I am sure this is not ideal for the players’ rest and recovery requirements. This set of fixtures also shows that quite plainly. Could the FAS do more? Probably. Should they? That is a harder question to answer. The gap between games and the back-to-back nature of them will make it hard for our Sailors, but is this any different from teams in the UEFA Champions League or Europa League? I am not so sure. If anything, our journeys to Vietnam and to Borneo may be nearer than some of the distances undertaken by European teams. Given our depth, we should be able to cope, and I hope we see minutes given to our fringe players as well, to help manage workload. Conclusion Nothing much more to say except that this could and should have been double digits. DPMM caught us on a very good day. They were horrendous. Till next time! Written by Eddy Hirono If you’d like to support the work we do here at SailorFanTalk, you may want to visit https://ko-fi.com/sailorfantalk and leave us a tip!