Daily Musings – Page 2 – SailorFanTalk

Albirex Match Preview – Play for the Badge

2 Comments / Daily Musings, Match Previews / Eddy Hirono

Let’s face it, our Sailors have not played well in the last 2 months. Whatever the reason for that downfall is, we now find ourselves in a position where we only have 2 points from our opening games in the Singapore Cup, when they were games against the bottom 2 in the league. The one that hurt most will be the game against Young Lions – we play in the Mitsubishi Electric AFF Cup in December, and a team boasting so many Singapore internationals cannot beat a team with one Singapore international, and no foreigners. It was dreadful. Pre-match comments from the players (see A fight for the badge, our fans – and pride – Lion City Sailors FC) indicate that they are eager to make amends, with Hariss Harun saying this – “We have to do it for them, for ourselves, and for the club. When we step onto the pitch, we represent the club and we have to play for the badge on our chest with pride and fire. “Play for the badge” is an oft-quoted phrase. It usually means to push yourself to your limit and to do your absolute best, to live up to the history of the badge, the club, and everything it represents. However, of course, the Lion City Sailors are a very new club. I am not so sure the history of the club is foremost on the players’ minds when they step out onto the pitch. And so perhaps a little bit of reframing would be good. Our players should think of these games as a tune-up for the AFF Cup. How’s their confidence gonna be if they’re struggling to win games against the likes of Balestier Khalsa and Young Lions? I don’t think football form is just a switch that they can turn on or off – play like crap when donning the Sailors uniform, and then come 24 December, just shake it off and do well in a Lions shirt. But if they are to play themselves into form, they are running out of opportunities to do so. This could very well be their last match tomorrow. If we fail to win, we are then left at the mercy of Young Lions and Balestier Khalsa. Any of those 2 teams win, and it’s curtains for us. Even as an ardent fan of the Sailors, I am not so sure I can say I feel confident heading into tomorrow’s game. We have failed to beat them in a league match since we rebranded as LCS, and our recent form has been very poor. I picked the Braveheart image because it’s blue and white, and also because I really hope our boys show some fight tomorrow. That’s all we ask for – give us a performance that we can be proud of, so that whatever the result, we can feel that they’ve done their best. Come on you Sailors.

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Meetup with FAS + Unexpected Appearance of a Lions Legend

Leave a Comment / Daily Musings / Eddy Hirono

Yesterday was an interesting day. I went to Jalan Besar Stadium for a meeting with FAS, along with representatives of other SPL clubs. We were supposed to meet with one of the administrators, a friendly chap named Aloysius, who is in charge of Competitions department in FAS, and has always been part of efforts to reach out to local football fans. What a surprise then to be greeted by Baihakki Khaizan, Lions centurion and legend. He introduced himself with a firm handshake, and beckoned us to follow him into the seminar room for our discussion. The purpose of this meeting was to discuss a fan club tournament to kick off the SPL next season. The rough idea is to do a 5v5 or 7v7 one-day tournament involving all the fan clubs, and do a mini-carnival where all the clubs can put up a booth to showcase themselves. The purpose of this would be to generate a bit of hype before the start of the season, and also to create more awareness about the fan clubs, and hopefully get more people to join and be passionate supporters of the local game through the respective clubs. Of course, there was also lots of chat about the upcoming AFF Mitsubishi Electric Cup, and what improvements can be made to the SPL. Some key points of discussion. Jay Chou concert meant that we could not play our games in the Sportshub There was lots of chatter online about how it is a joke that we have a multi-million dollar stadium but we are unable to play our AFF Cup home games there. Instead, we are consigned to the much-smaller Jalan Besar Stadium. FAS Secretary-General Yazeen Buhari popped by during our meeting and explained how this happened. When AFF first gave dates for the AFF Cup to take place, they said it would be sometime in January 2023. As such, FAS worked with Sportshub to reserve the month of January for Lions games. Jay Chou’s concerts take place on 17 and 18 December 2022. Yazeen said that to Sportshub’s credit, they did not resist much when the request to book the month of January was made, given the importance of hosting national team games there, and they made sure no commercial bookings were made for that month. However, by the time AFF confirmed the dates, it then came to be that our first home game would be on 24 December against Myanmar, a mere 6 days after the Jay Chou concert. Some of us were curious – was it truly impossible to prepare the venue for the game if there’s a 6-day gap between the concert and our first game? Yazeen told us it was impossible – the Sportshub crew would have to wheel out the concrete surface used for Jay Chou’s concert, wheel in the grass surface used for the football games, and then it would need a further period of time for the soil and grass to truly settle in and be a stable playing surface. This will take at least 2 – 3 weeks. We know of the Sportshub’s previous struggles with grass surfaces even when we hosted huge international teams like Brazil and Japan, so I think it’s understandable that such protocols are in place to ensure the integrity of the playing surface. Playing at a smaller stadium – is it a bad thing? In my opinion, it’s not a bad thing. Jalan Besar Stadium is a unique ground in Singapore because it’s one of the few purpose-built football stadiums. The fans are so close to the pitch because there is no running track. This really allows the fans to chant and sing for 90min, and transmit that energy to the players. It was interesting that this view was backed up by Baihakki. He said a combination of factors, such as the artificial turf, the closeness to the fans, the size of the pitch, and of course, the excellent results achieved there over the years make Jalan Besar Stadium a very conducive place for our Lions to get the results we need to qualify for the knockout stages. While he understands that more fans get to go in and watch the Lions if the match was held at Sportshub, he feels that this enforced change is in no way a bad thing. VAR in the SPL Some fans expressed their concern at the refereeing standards in the SPL, and were not confident that VAR would be of much help. My opinion is that it should help, given that referees have a very difficult task of watching multiple things going on at the same time, plus they are also called upon to make snap decisions that can greatly influence the outcomes of games. As Sailors fans, we have both benefitted and been screwed by such decisions this season – but I feel like we should take a step back and realise that this happens everywhere in the world. VAR should help because it buys time for the referee to look at the incident with various angles, and be in discussion with the rest of his team to arrive at the best decision. It may cause delays, but at least in my opinion it will lead to the correct decision more often. Baihakki told us that he knows what we go through as fans, and he does feel that perhaps modern referees lack the human touch of the great refs of the previous era, such as Shamsul Maidin, and Abdul Malik. Aloysius then explained further that VAR needs to be implemented sooner or later, or we will not be able to host AFC tournaments, and also our referees would become obsolete – who wants a referee at big tournaments who has zero experience dealing with VAR? Basically, we’re just keeping up with the times. Other stuff Talked about a lot of other stuff as well, but I guess the main snippet I want to remember is this – Yazeen looked at me

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Young Lions Match Preview – Must-Win Game

Leave a Comment / Daily Musings, Match Previews / Eddy Hirono

As the title suggests, this is a must-win game, especially after we dropped points in our opener against Balestier Khalsa. A draw here would leave us needing to win against Albirex Niigata, and we don’t want to be in that situation. In all our league fixtures against the Young Lions, we’ve won every single one, and that should be the expectation. Here’s where we address the question that might be in your head – “Hey Eddy why’d you pick a picture of Patrice Evra to headline this post?” The older fans among us may remember in 2009, after Manchester United defeated Arsenal to qualify for the UEFA Champions League final, Patrice Evra boasted to the press that it was 11 men v 11 babies. Even as an Arsenal fan, I can admit how clearly they dominated the two legs of that semi-final and eventually won 4-1 on aggregate. How is this linked to the Sailors? Well, if you monitor the online chat before every game against the Young Lions, or if you’re a betting man, you monitor the bookmakers’ odds, you’ll realise that everyone thinks the Sailors are going to win big everytime. “Men v babies” – except this time it’s quite literal because the Young Lions are a young developmental side and we’ve literally got the National Team playing for us, with a sprinkling of foreign professionals who’ve played at the highest levels of this game. It may then surprise you to note that while we have thumped the Young Lions 10-1 and 5-1 this season, the other 2 outings against them have been pretty tense and settled by 1-goal margins. Even last season, we needed a red card and a Jorge Fellipe masterclass to finally break them down on our way to the title. Soooooo all that’s to say it’s not a foregone conclusion and our Sailors should not turn up expecting a walk in the park. At the same time, if we cannot win the Young Lions, then our problems are deeper than they already seem to be. Raoul Suhaimi has had a very promising season with the Young Lions (future Sailor, anyone?) but he sits out this one because of suspension. Hopefully Song Ui-Yong come back from Covid-19 and is able to play some role in this game as well. It would be very useful for him to get some minutes under his belt because if we go deep in this competition we will need his goals and drive from midfield. Arrogance? There has been a lot of talk about whether Luka Lalic is arrogant. From his comments after the first game he took charge where he not very subtly hinted that the players were not having fun under Coach Kim, to his sarcastic comments last week about Balestier Khalsa’s players feigning cramps to see out the time, he has not been a popular guy with neutral fans. I wasn’t a fan of the shade thrown at Coach Kim, but I was a lot more OK with my coach being sarcastic about the opponents’ time-wasting tactics. Look, I get it – the smaller team is always going to want to cling on to a result against a side like the Sailors. In my books, a little gamesmanship is totally fine. If the Sailors were playing in the AFC Champions League and were leading say, Urawa Red Diamonds 2-1 – I’d totally want us to be time-wasting at every opportunity to bring home the win. But I’d also accept it if the opponents were slightly annoyed. I don’t think you should engage in gamesmanship and then expect that nobody is going to say anything about it. It’s all part of the game – both ways. You get to do what you want, we get to say what we want (within reason). But to end off this post, let me go back to Patrice Evra. When he boasted that United playing Arsenal was like men v babies, many neutrals turned on him because they felt it was too arrogant and disrespectful. I remember thinking to myself – I hope they get humiliated in the final. And they did. They were thoroughly outplayed in the final by a great Barcelona side, and Messi even managed to score a header (he only has 24 headed goals in his long career). Pride comes before a fall – I certainly hope Lalic and the players remember this, and take the Young Lions seriously if we are to avoid another early cup upset (a Cupset, if you will). Come on you boys in blue.

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Post-Match Thoughts – Chaos (LCS 3 Balestier Khalsa 3)

Leave a Comment / Daily Musings, Post-Match Thoughts / Eddy Hirono

Well, that was …. interesting I guess. We had two guests from the UK over to watch the game, and they were thoroughly entertained. Which is not exactly great for us. Three times we went ahead, three times we were pegged back by what seemed like very avoidable (and very chaotic) goals. First goal, I thought Izwan should have parried it away harder, but unfortunately it went straight back into the middle of the penalty area and the rebound was swept home. Second goal and third goal, I thought Hafiz Nor could have done way better. But to be fair to him, he’s not a traditional right-back. If Tajeli and Mamat were available, he would not be in that position at all. It is a worrying sign that we seem to be struggling against a side that is the second-bottom in the league. It is also a very worrying sign that while we had 20+ shots, our opponents also had 20+ shots. This is why I picked the word “chaos” to describe last night’s game. I am not privy to the stats but I do wonder if the LCS fitness staff can see a drop-off in performance in terms of hard yards run because to the naked eye, it really seems to me that we look very tired. And let me get this straight – I am not blaming the boys for this. I think we can all see from last season how Tampines suffered badly after they came back from their Champions League games. Physically, they looked spent. And I feel we’re seeing much of the same from our Sailors in the past 2 months. It really seems like when an attack breaks down, our players just don’t have the legs to get back in time to keep our opposition out. If there’s anyone / anything to blame, I think I’d question why more of our squad players were not used earlier in the campaign. I look at someone like Hami Syahin, who I used to call the Singaporean Thiago Alcantara, and wonder, could he not have replaced Shahdan in some games once the game was won? Could he not have started in more games? The gulf between our lineup and the lineup of our opponents should be a huge one – at least on paper. If there is any criticism of Kim Do-Hoon, I guess he was abit too conservative and did not trust the bench players more. Might that have helped to preserve some of the legs of our key players a little? It’s hard to say. I will probably address all this in a longer post in my end-of-season review. I have seen a lot of talk also about how Luka Lalic is to blame for this alone. I am not so sure about that. While I am not the greatest fan of his big talk and how he shat on Kim Do-Hoon after his appointment, I think the players have to take some responsibility too. Their opponents are mostly not national team players, while we’re chock-full of them and have the luxury of calling on players like Hami Syahin and Gabriel Quak off the bench. Surely, man for man, we’re the Galacticos of local football. That we have to rely on Maxime Lestienne again and again is not really making me feel very optimistic about the Sailors, and by extension, our national team. This is essentially the mild version of what Joseph had to say. If you want the full blow of his disappointed rant, please head on down to his post-match reactions taken last night (Post-Match Reactions – Lion City Sailors v Balestier Khalsa (Singapore Cup 27 Oct ’22) – YouTube). For now, just two things before I end this post. 1) I hope Lalic manages to find a way to minimise errors from our players moving forward. If we continue making these mistakes, we will definitely not win the Cup. 2) We have got a guest writer to write tactical analysis posts on our Singapore Cup games, and tonight we will be publishing the first of these posts. Look out for it!

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Balestier Khalsa Match Preview – Four Thrashings and a Funeral

Leave a Comment / Daily Musings, Match Previews / Eddy Hirono

It’s matchday later today, and our boys are gonna be up for revenge against Balestier Khalsa (or at least I hope so). The older readers may recognise the reference made in the title of this post, and may be wondering what exactly I am referring to. Well, if you look at our last 5 games against Balestier Khalsa, you will see four easy wins – 4-1, 4-0, 6-1, and 4-0. Then came the “funeral”. On 2 October, a rainy night when the Singapore Grand Prix also took place, Sailors title hopes were effectively extinguished as we needed at least a draw to keep pace with fellow title challengers Albirex Niigata (S), but we managed to throw away a 2-0 lead to end up losing 5-3. So what happened? The Sailors were dominating play and were very comfortable. Song Ui Yong had a couple of brilliant goals, and even though at half-time the score was 2-1, I don’t think too many people would have bet on Balestier ending the night as winners. But then, the rain came. And just as it had a huge impact on proceedings in Marina Bay in the Grand Prix, the rain had a similarly big impact on the game in Toa Payoh Stadium. Suddenly, visibility became poor, the ball got stuck in the mud, and play was becoming increasingly difficult. More difficult for the Sailors, who rely on nice crisp passing football to break down our opponents, than for the Tigers, who routinely go Route 1. Of course, the Tigers are also more adept at playing on this potato patch of a field. Could we just blame the rain though? I don’t think so. I felt the Sailors were way too sloppy that night, and in fact, two of the goals were scored when our players cleared the ball straight to opponents on the edge of the box. At professional level, to do it once in a game is bad enough, twice, simply remarkable regardless of conditions. I remember feeling kinda low, because I felt we were the architects of our own downfall. No matter how treacherous the conditions were, I felt our players definitely could have found more within themselves to deal with it. We just seemed to panic all the time – PTSD from our loss to Daegu in similar circumstances in Buriram? Perhaps. No More Potato Patch Tonight But hey, tonight’s game will be at Jalan Besar Stadium, so the pitch won’t be a factor anymore. Our boys will have to perform. Same long-term injuries remain out I suppose, so we still won’t have Mamat, Pedro Henrique, Amiruldin Asraf. Maxime Lestienne returns from suspension, while hopefully Kim Shin-Wook finds his scoring boots again so we can put Balestier to the sword and get our campaign off to a flying start. We were unconvincing against Young Lions, but perhaps it was hard to get everyone up for a dead rubber. This is when it matters – so come on you boys in blue!

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SailorFanTalk.com slowly coming to life?

Leave a Comment / Daily Musings / Eddy Hirono

The website is still pretty sparse. I guess balancing this with a full-time job isn’t as easy as I thought it would be! The fact that we may have an extended break with rumours of a late start to 2023’s SPL season may work to my advantage, allowing me more time to load this site with content to truly allow it to be what I envisioned it to be. For now, we’ve started small. I’ve filled out the FAQ section with some questions that newer fans like to ask, so hopefully this helps to get the information out there. Do ask your friends who are new to the Sailors to read that page, and also to feel free to ask us any other questions they may have. I am pretty excited about this week actually. We ended the SPL season with a bit of a whimper, with unconvincing performance after unconvincing performance, eventually culminating in Albirex reclaiming their title in deserved fashion. The Singapore Cup represents our only chance of silverware this year, so I hope we grasp it with both hands. To further add to the excitement, we might be bringing you a detailed tactical analysis of our first Cup game against Balestier Khalsa. We’re playing in Jalan Besar Stadium on Thursday, so hopefully Balestier Khalsa will not be as formidable, given that the potato pitch they played on in the last game contributed a little to their victory over us. Detailed tactical analyses are just one of the many different types of content we hope to bring our fans at SailorFanTalk, as we hope to really be the one-stop-shop for all things Sailors. Food reviews, merchandise unveilings, transfer rumours, daily musings – all that and more. It’s an exciting time to be a SailorFanTalk fan! Can’t wait!

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A New Chapter for SailorFanTalk

Leave a Comment / Daily Musings / Eddy Hirono

We’ve spoken about this for a while now, but now it’s finally happening. We finally have a website! We have always wanted to create more content for the local football space, and especially for LCS fans, so this is our first step into longer-form text content. We have very exciting plans and we hope to be able to execute all of these plans, but we ask for your patience and forbearance. After all, we’re new to this! Why a website? We think that blogging is a long-lost tradition and we hope to bring it back in some form. Most days, what you can expect from the content here is just random musings every few days – but some days we hope to bring you exciting content that will engage you. Tactical analyses, player interviews, thoughts on transfer rumours, and more. Possibilities are endless! Also, at the start of the season we never thought we’d actually be able to achieve 100% SailorFanTalk Post-Match Reactions – i.e. we made it to every game, and always ended the game with an interview of the Sailors fans you see at games. We did this for every men’s game, and when the Women’s Premier League came along, we only missed a handful of games – we really tried our best but some weeks were just super busy! We are happy with what we’ve done so far, but we know we can do more, so here we are. If you have any ideas for what we should do, let us know and we’ll try to do it! Of course, resources and time may be a problem, but I am confident we will get there!

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