[Post-Match Thoughts] Chaos, Again (Balestier Khalsa 4 LCS 5)

At the tail-end of last season, I used the headline “Chaos” to describe the Singapore Cup game against Balestier Khalsa that ended 3-3.

It was much the same on Thursday night, and while we got the all-important win that I craved and talked about in our preview article, I think there is some cause for worry watching the game against Balestier Khalsa yet again end in a goalfest. Back in October 2022, it was a mad game where both sides had 20+ shots each. While it wasn’t exactly the same volume this time round, Balestier actually out-shot us, taking 16 shots to our 12 shots. In terms of shots on target, we had 8, while they had 7. We really need to work on our defence.

Frail Defence

I’ve said it many times before, but it is so worrying that Zharfan is the keeper that has made the most saves this season. In some of our games, we have seen our opponents take shots from improbable angles, or far out, but that was not the case this time.

Of the 16 shots taken by Balestier, only 3 were from outside the box. You don’t always need stats to back up what you can see and feel from the game – and from the stands, there was a growing sense of unease in the last 10 minutes in the game when it really looked like we were unable to slow the game down, and make Balestier chase shadows. Instead, we were treated to a barrage of long balls into the box, and some very nervy defending.

I think if you were to pick a word to describe the way we defended, it would be “soft”. The goal by Fabian Kwok I think we can say that Nur Adam should have done way better as he seemed to completely lose his man and not put in a good aerial challenge. First set piece into the box, and right after we scored, we immediately hand our opponents a set-piece goal. Soft.

Second goal from them was just as disappointing. Routine ball into the box and Shuhei Hoshino wins the header. This is not unexpected – he is called “Jumbo” for a reason. However, what is very disappointing is a little bit of lack of co-ordination and perhaps not anticipating the danger.

In the screencap above, you can see that Ryoya has already started to make a run into the box, anticipating that Jumbo is going to win the header and knock the ball down into the box. Adam Swandi sees the danger, and you can see him pointing out to Hariss to follow Ryoya’s run. However, Hariss doesn’t seem to hear Adam and as such doesn’t realise the danger until it is too late. Again, it is very soft.

The third goal I will give the Sailors backline a pass – it was a fortuitous strike by Darren Teh that was mishit so bad that it dropped straight to Shuhei for him to score. I think you’d need to be Dr. Strange to be able to predict what would happen from there. However, the penalty is probably in my mind, the worst of the lot. With a 2-goal lead and 10 minutes to go, you’d think the Sailors should be calm and see the game out. However, that little shirt tug is anything but calm. Super came on as a second-half sub and he should have seen that all game, Daniel Goh had been going down to try to win fouls for his team (no slight against him by the way, it is his job to do so, and the penalty was rightly awarded). So when he’s running nowhere, he’s on his weaker left foot, and Hami Syahin is literally waiting for him to take a heavy touch, don’t give the referee a chance to award the penalty. Unfortunately, Super couldn’t resist it, and had a cheeky tug at Daniel Goh.

Whether the tug was enough to send Daniel Goh down I think is irrelevant. Of course, he milked it, but why wouldn’t he? We shouldn’t put ourselves in such positions. We cannot afford a repeat of this against Tampines next week.

Purring Attack

Our front 3 + Diego Lopes are just such a joy to watch. After all the negatives of the preceding paragraphs, let’s talk about some good stuff.

Shawal

One week after scoring a fantastic winning goal against Albirex, we go and do one better by putting in a legit Goal of the Season contender. It was a weak and indecisive clearance from Hairul, but when it dropped to Shawal on his weak foot, I think only the most optimistic of Sailors fans would have said that Shawal was gonna score from near the halfway line. But the ball arced and dipped from high in the night sky, and eventually landed into the back of the net without bouncing. Shoutout to Nur Adam as well, whose brilliantly-timed tackle (while on a yellow card, mind) set the wheels in motion.

A fantastic opportunistic strike which Shawal will not forget in a hurry. When we spoke to Shawal about the goal, interestingly he said it was not the best goal he ever scored. Check out his interview, and also watch the goal that he claims was his best ever strike. (We disagree with Shawal btw! We think that Thursday’s strike was from further out, and was more difficult because he had to hit it when the ball was bouncing.)

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Abdul Rasaq

While he didn’t score, he was instrumental in two of the goals we did. For our 4th goal, his clever backheel sets Lestienne bursting into the box and crossing for Shawal to tap in, while for the 5th goal, it is his tenacity to win the header in midfield which then allows Diego Lopes to set Lestienne free for the 5th goal.

He will bemoan the two times that he would have felt he could have done better in front of goal, but on current form, he definitely deserves his starting spot over Bernie. Interesting sidenote about Bernie – while us fans may not be very enthusiastic about his recent performances, we have been hearing from insiders that Bernie is performing pretty impressively in training. I guess we shall see if he can carry his training form into matchday situations. I liked his little rugby tackle late in the game to stop a Balestier counter though – it shows that he is willing to put the team’s needs over his own, and that’s always good.

Lestienne and Lopes

Diego’s skilful and improvised back-flick to Maxime Lestienne which allowed him to shoot first-time into the far corner without breaking stride was a thing of beauty. The sight of the two of them combining to score a goal must be one that really keeps defenders awake at night. They know it’s coming, they know how it looks like, but they just cannot stop it. I won’t spend too many column inches talking about how good they are – it is obvious.

Conclusion

Pre-match, I called upon the Sailors not to waste the Albirex win by dropping points to a tricky Balestier side. We did that. We managed to really get at Balestier’s weak defence and score 5 goals. Peter de Roo said in post-match interview that the space in front of the defenders was exploited time and again, which was something we pointed out in our preview that we had to really look at as a weakness in the Balestier set-up. Balestier have now conceded 40 goals this season.

However, if we are to really challenge for the title, there is much work to do. It is pretty telling that Coach Risto said that this was our worst performance of the season. Maxime as well, said in a post-match interview that we cannot be conceding 4 goals in a game, regardless of how many we score.

I don’t quite know what Coach Risto is going to do from now until next week’s game, but massive improvement is needed or I fear that we will lose further ground in the title race.

Written by Eddy Hirono

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