After the high of qualifying for the semi-finals of the ACL2 competition, our Sailors must now come back to Earth and re-focus on our Singapore Cup campaign. Let’s dive right into a short preview of tonight’s game.
Domestic Treble a Priority
You may remember that after winning the Community Shield last year, Technical Director Luka Lalic put up an IG post stating that 33% of a treble was done. If you don’t remember it, look at this.
Now, I believe he wasn’t so optimistic at the start of the season to think that we would win the Shopee Cup or the ACL2, so I think he might well have been referring to the domestic treble – SPL, Singapore Cup, and of course, the Community Shield that we’ve already won.
That being the case, tonight’s game is important, because BG Pathum has started well in this competition, and Balestier Khalsa are our direct rivals for qualification too. I have always maintained that for a team of our resources, we have to dominate every domestic competition.
Of course, we have a game in hand, but we want to enter the game against Geylang with a 5-point lead so that regardless of what happens, they can’t catch us.
Rotation
Even though we don’t play till later on in the month, I have a feeling Coach Ranko will rotate some players into the starting 11. He will be aware that Wednesday’s game would have taken a fair bit out of certain players, while also taking into account the impending international window where our Singaporean players (ana Ali Alrina for Syria) will not have much of a break at all.
Shawal came on and went off in the last game so might have his minutes managed again, while Maxime surely won’t be available after he looked to have dislocated his elbow on Wednesday.
I think it’s also important to keep players sharp. With Maxime’s injury, we may have to lean on our bench a bit more, so I think it would be good for the bench players to get some meaningful minutes.
Dangerman – Kodai Tanaka
The dangerman is an obvious one. Kodai Tanaka, previously of LCS before his horrific knee injury, will be the one to watch out for.
He has a whopping tally of 20 goals and 11 assists, 2 goals fewer than our very own Lennart Thy, but with 6 more assists to his name. In recent games, he seems to have added something into his arsenal – the ability to run with the ball over long stretches and provide a pass for his teammates. This wasn’t always the case with Kodai, who was most known for his penalty box prowess in the past.
You can see the varied threat that Kodai Tanaka poses from the types of goals he is scoring.
Of course, without Anton Fase alongside him, and Alen Kozar pulling the strings in midfield, it might be a little harder for Kodai to thrive, but that didn’t stop him in Balestier’s previous game, where he got a goal, an assist, and also forced an own goal as Balestier beat Geylang.
He does however, have joint-top local scorer Ignatius Ang to look for on the pitch though. Ignatius is playing his best ever season in his long career, and we will have to look out for him as well. With 8 goals and 4 assists in the league, Ignatius is also in pretty good form, and was the matchwinner last time out against Geylang.
Balestier’s Strange Form
Balestier’s form is pretty strange.
Losing to Young Lions and Albirex, but managing to pick up 2 wins over an impressive Geylang team, on top of securing all three points in an away trip to DPMM – you never quite know what you’re gonna get with Balestier Khalsa on any given day.
Conclusion
With Alen Kozar and Anton Fase out, we have to capitalise.
I think we should have too much for Balestier Khalsa, and I predict us to get back to winning ways after two consecutive draws.
COME ON YOU BOYS IN BLUE!
My predicted line-up
Izwan Mahbud
Akram Azman, Ali Alrina, Bailey Wright, Toni Datkovic, Sergio Carmona
Rui Pires, Anumanthan Kumar
Abdul Rasaq, Shawal Anuar, Bart Ramselaar
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!
Eddy’s prediction: Sailors 4 Balestier Khalsa 1
Joseph’s prediction: Sailors 2 Balestier Khalsa 0
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!
