All season long, we’ve been asking for a solid defensive performance, and more control in our games, and that is exactly what we got on Sunday night. It was a long day for some of us in the Crew because we had to get up bright and early at 7am to go down to Mattar Road for the Tasek Sailors charity event. We will be writing a fuller article on that sometime soon to talk abit more about the day and of course, the wonderful initiative that is the Tasek Sailors. In any case, we played in the corporate tournament and managed to advance to the Quarter-Finals, but were then knocked out by a solitary goal. Congrats to Deloitte for winning the tournament!
So after a full day of baking in the sun, we made the trip down to Bishan Stadium, a little tired and hoping the team would give us all a lift with their performance. They did that, and in very handsome fashion – just look at this.
Hougang only managed 1 shot all game, and when you look at the shots chart, it further highlights our dominance.
Nazrul Nazari’s shot (in red) from far out was their only attempt all night, and it was comfortable for Zharfan. There was another near-miss when old boy Gabriel Quak did excellently to beat Nur Adam on the right flank and put in a decent cross, which was eventually deflected onto the post by Super, but other than that, Hougang hardly troubled us at all.
Adam Swandi’s advanced position
Unlike in many games this season where Adam Swandi was played at the base of midfield alongside Hami Syahin, this game saw Adam operate much further forward, in line with Maxime and Diego. There was very fluid interchanging of positions between the three of them, and Hougang struggled to cope. When we spoke to Lionel Tan after the game, he also had very nice things to say about Adam Swandi playing higher up the field.
Of course, the results don’t lie. Adam had two goals, and an assist, and if not for the crossbar, would have had a hattrick. Adam doesn’t get many goals – even when he was an integral part of Albirex’s title-winning squad in 2018 (he clinched Young Player of the Year as they went unbeaten all season), he only scored 4 goals in all competitions. In some of our earlier posts, we had also addressed the squad being a little reliant on Maxime and Diego. It is thus heartening to see different players step up. In this game, we scored 3 goals, and only one had involvement from Maxime / Diego, with Maxime picking up the assist for the 3rd goal.
I will leave the detailed tactical analysis to Zach – hopefully he can explain in a little more detail why it worked so well. I can see why Adam Swandi was deployed deep, because his confidence on the ball could help us to get out of tight areas and hold the ball and make us a bit more press-resistant, but it was definitely refreshing and nice to see him trying more stuff on the ball as a direct consequence of him being in an advanced position. Long may this continue.
Clean Sheet + Magnificent Anu
It was just our 4th clean sheet of the season, after 15 games played. It was a well-deserved one, and I think a lot of credit goes not just to the back 4, but also to Anu, who once again had a great match in the middle of the park. He continued his good form from the games he played for the national team during the international break, and was constantly snapping into challenges, and always in the right place to break up any attack from Hougang. Hougang’s talisman Kiki Krajcek had a very rare off-day, and alot of credit for that has to go to Anu.
On top of doing his defensive duties, he used the ball well. In particular, there was a moment in the first half where he played such a good dink into the box for Diego to create a chance for Maxime, which Maxime uncharacteristically wasted.
If you look at Anu on the ball here, there really isn’t much on for him, and I thought he may have gone for the slightly easier ball over to the right hand side of the pitch where Hafiz Nor was in space – but he proved me wrong and played it over the top for Diego. In a match where our opponents were content to sit back – it was important for Anu to be a little more ambitious.
No Coach Risto
I did say in the preview that I was a little apprehensive. I think sacking a coach mid-season will do that for your nerves. However, I think this was the perfect performance to help ease some of those nerves. I hope the players and fans are not getting carried away – after all last season’s first game after Coach Kim left saw us beat Young Lions 10-1 in a record-breaking victory. Also, Hougang were really there for the taking, and for large periods of the game, it felt like a training exercise of attack v defence. The fact that Hougang missed both Shahdan and Zulfahmi in midfield probably contributed to that.
However, taking away all of Hougang’s flaws on the day, I think there was a lot more structure and intention in the way we built from the back – something that I hope once again that Zach will help to explain in further detail. To my relatively untrained eye (compared to Zach), it looked like the centrebacks were pushed a bit wider in the build-up, the full-backs held the width in attack almost like wingers, while Lestienne, Diego, and Adam Swandi were allowed a nice little platform in the middle of the pitch to combine with each other to devastating effect.
It was a very controlled performance, and if you take a look at the tactical analysis of the previous time we faced Hougang (a 5-0 victory in April), you will see that this was by far the more impressive performance.
We conceded 25 shots that day, and Hougang even had more shots on target. Zharfan pulled off some really good saves and allowed us to keep the clean sheet that day. While the 5-0 victory was built on the back of some Maxime brilliance, I think it is definitely more heartening that this was a complete team performance. It is rumoured that the new coach (who is to be announced soon) had a hand in some of the tactics for this game, and if that is so, I hope we can continue to see more of such controlled performances moving forwards.
Abdul Rasaq
And I’d like to end this post with just another paragraph of appreciation for Abdul Rasaq. All night he was threat, and helped to keep the defenders occupied. When the chance came for him in the first half to get the crucial first goal, he obliged. It would have been a bit of a downer to enter half-time at 0-0 considering the chances we created. Maxime missed a sitter, while he also hit the bar with a rare headed effort. Abdul Rasaq made no such mistake, and when the chance came, he gobbled it up to give us a morale-boosting lead going into the break. It was vital that he did so – sometimes in such attack v defence games, you don’t take your chances and you get hit by a sucker punch. That’s now 8 goals for Abdul Rasaq, who has risen to the challenge brilliantly after Kodai’s heart-breaking injury. He then had to see off the challenge of Bernie as well, and it speaks volumes about his performances that he is able to consistently start over the most famous name.
Just a joy to see him being the top local goal-scorer. And on that positive note, thanks for reading this, I am now off to watch Tampines v Albirex. Let’s hope for a 4-4 draw with 4 red cards each side.
Written by Eddy Hirono
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