Match Previews

I may be showing my age a little with this introduction to the article, but when I was looking at the standings and playing out all the permutations in my mind, the song “Any Dream Will Do” kept popping into my head, except it was “Any Draw Will Do”. It’s a song that’s been covered by numerous artistes, and made the subject of parodies as well. When writing, you shouldn’t sidetrack yourself right from the get-go in the first paragraph, but this is not my day job, so who cares. Do check out the song as performed in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat, the musical, and then also the hilarious Chelsea and Jose Mourinho inspired parody, harking back to the early days when Jose Mourinho first took charge of Chelsea and bought tons of players due to the funds made available by Roman Abramovich, forever changing the landscape of English football, and dare I say, all football. Back to the point – I genuinely believe that a draw will allow us to qualify for the knock-out stages because I have confidence in Port FC to beat Persib Bandung in Thailand. And if that happens, an away draw at Zhejiang will take us through to the next stage. But that’s just my conclusion, let’s dive right into some of the other thoughts I have coming into this game. Stakes are High – for BOTH Teams After the madness of the last 10 minutes in Jalan Besar Stadium when we somehow fucked up a 2-0 lead to lose 3-2 (not even a draw, not even a draw, ARGHHHHHHHHHHHH), the group has been blown wide open. Zhejiang, despite losing 3 of their 4 games so far, find themselves in a position where they can still qualify. And it’s not even a fanciful possibility. Simply put, they just have to beat us, then beat Persib next week. After that, hope that we don’t take all 3 points against Port FC at Jalan Besar Stadium. Take a look for yourself how this might all pan out. For us, this represents a chance to make it to the knockout stages, to prolong our continental adventure. Truthfully though, the stakes might be even higher for Zhejiang. Why? In the SPL, barring a crazy collapse, we are guaranteed entry into next year’s ACL2 tournament. However, the Chinese Super League has already concluded and Zhejiang is in 7th, nowhere near the continental qualification spots. This is very much the last-chance saloon for them – they need to win to progress, and then try their best to win the whole damn tournament so they qualify for the ACL Elite. Failure to pick up a win here will extinguish their chances of making it to the next round, and with it, any continental competition next season. There’s also the question of pride, given how both us and Zhejiang lost our previous ACL2 game … being at home, they will want to show their thousands of fans that they are capable of bringing some cheer to what has been a difficult season for them. Chomping at the Bit Till It’s Gone Both teams will be chomping at the bit, eager to get going again after the last defeat. However, it has been quite a while since both teams have played. There have been no official matches since 3 weeks ago. If the teams were horses chomping at the bit, the bit would probably be gone by now. I include a picture of a horse and its “bit” so that you can see how the phrase originated. Of course in this case, I am not so sure I’d be sending my kids to Shane English School considering that they wrote “it it mouth” in their advert. Shane English School, more like Shame English School. Back to the point. Usually when you lose a game, you’d want to hop right back into action, to put things right. You’d ideally want a game against Tanjong Pagar United 5 days later – stick on the first team, let them rack up a 5-0 scoreline by the 60th minute, then put on some of your reserves to finish the game. However, there was none of that for us as we didn’t have any league games. We did have a morale-boosting friendly against JDT where we lost 1-0 but by all accounts looked pretty solid. It was also good that players like Bill Mahmadou got gametime and impressed. The rest of our Singapore NT players had abit of a mixed bag of results, beating Myanmar unconvincingly 3-2, but then losing to Chinese Taipei. How will this lack of rhythm affect us? Will our players have been dwelling on this result? I can’t say for sure, but I guess that at least in the international fixtures, Shawal kept up his impressive form, finding the net twice in 2 games. He’s definitely one to look out for. Who Else To Look Out For? Besides our superstar Shawal, I think what deserves a mention is that Bart Ramselaar should be back from suspension. You’ll remember his red card against Persib. That was 2 games ago, and I am reliably informed that he will be involved in this game. We’ve not seen any other news of any other absentees – plus we’ve seen all our players in action in training videos and airport videos and the like, so we can only assume that the full squad is fit and raring to go. On the Zhejiang side, it’s very much the same team that we saw against us at Jalan Besar Stadium, and I just hope that we do abit better closing down Li Tixiang. Often, he was given too much time in my opinion to pick out a pass, and his cultured left foot is capable of some really good deliveries. The first time we met Zhejiang, he created a few chances which required Izwan to be at his best to preserve the clean sheet. Their wingers of course, will

Why is the Bandung drink more expensive when our opponents sell it? Because they charge per-sip. Ok now that we got that horrible joke out of the way, let’s talk about some serious stuff. If we win against Persib tonight, and Port notch a win away from home in Zhejiang, we are through. That’s how crazy it is. Lose the game, and if Zhejiang get a point or a win, and the group is blown wide open. Such are the margins and possibilities in this group. Let’s take a look, and then dive right into the preview. Manage Expectations and Get Behind the Team After giving it the good ol’ buildup, that must be a very downer title to read. Potong steam, as we say. Expectations are high because we’ve beaten Zhejiang at home, and then got 2 very creditable away results. People will also remember that last year, we put in a performance for the ages, defeating Korean giants Jeonbuk on home soil. (Sidenote – can you say home soil, considering artificial turf has no soil? Something to think about) However, our Sailors also lost at home to Bangkok United, and more surprisingly, Kitchee FC last year. Also, let’s not forget that Persib is a team that is still unbeaten domestically (5 wins and 5 draws), and is only 1 point off the top of the table. Their star striker David Da Silva is also back from injury. and his record last season was stellar. 30 matches, 26 goals, 8 assists in the league – surely someone to fear. I can’t say I’ve seen much of him but I get a little scared reading the record. We don’t really know what we can expect from Persib considering that when we played them, they played almost half the game with 10 men. The fact that we couldn’t break them down after gives me a bit of cause for worry as well. Oh, and of course, it was the night where Bart Ramselaar got sent off, and is thus unavailable for us again tonight. Thus, cautious optimism is what I preach, and more importantly, get behind the team. If we concede an early goal, or two, just keep going. As fans, we can be a part of this very special night. Every footballer I speak with tells me that they get a little extra boost when they can feel the crowd behind them. They go into tackles more confident, there’s a swagger when they go on a dribble, there’s that extra bit of oomph when they head a ball away. Coach Ranko in his press conference today has called for a full stadium to roar the boys on, and I hope we will see that. Persib fans will definitely bring the noise, so let’s be on our best form too in the stands. Bart’s Suspension – Lack of Creativity? I am a little worried about our creativity against Persib. Reason? I suspect they will sit back and try to hit us on the counter with their pacy players. The second-half performance in the first game will give them all the confidence that they can hold us at bay. Aside from the header they conceded from a very good Maxime cross, I cannot really remember when we really threatened their goal. And that was with 10 men. Even though Bart has only 5 assists in all competitions, without the threat through the middle of midfield that Bart sometimes provides, and the shooting ability which may help to open up space for his fellow midfielders, I fear that Persib will double-team Maxime and realise that nullifying him means taking away a large part of the Sailors threat. From the right of midfield, the threat is clear, Maxime Lestienne – 19 assists in the league after 17 games played. Surprisingly, of the 6 goals we’ve scored in the ACL2, only 2 saw a direct involvement from Maxime – 1 goal and 1 assist. I think you’ll agree with me here when I say that it’s a matter of time before we see a greater contribution from our brilliant Belgian. Where else do we turn for creativity? Shawal has 10 assists in the league, Lennart Thy has 3. Song Ui Young? Zero assists. But it’s to the latter 2 where I feel the “creativity” can come. Just like in the game against Port, I have a feeling that hard work is what will reap rewards for us. What we may lack in craft, we can certainly make up for it in graft. Graft, by the way is one of the English language’s shitty words. Graft could mean hard work, but could also mean shady, corrupt practices. So while I could be saying that we can create our own chances through sheer hard work and grit, it may be misinterpreted by some to mean we can go right ahead and bribe the referee. For the avoidance of doubt, that is not what I mean. We’re gonna press them from the front, and force them into mistakes. Lennart Thy and Song will play a big part in that. Speaking of Song … Song Has a Point to Prove There was an interesting moment in the pre-match press conference held yesterday when a reporter asked Coach Ranko is Song Ui Young was injured. The reason for asking? The NT call-ups have been announced, and one notable exclusion is Song Ui-Young. This has caught some by surprise because he finally looks to be playing himself into some kind of form. He’s scored in his last game in the league, as well as the ACL2. Both goals highlight his ability to sniff out a chance, and make a late run to escape the attention of defenders. Of course, he has done this for years, but recently he just lost his way a little. What is surprising is that when he finallly plays himself back into some form, and seems to be one of the few NT players able to

After what seems like forever, especially after our Sailors had their last match in Bangkok postponed, we finally see our boys in action again. Apologies for the late preview – it’s gonna be really short as well. I’ve come down with a heat exhaustion injury + food poisoning over the last couple of days, and my body has been doing all sorts of horrible things. But never mind, off to the preview we go. The last 2 times we faced Hougang resulted in very routine victories – 4-1 and 7-1, and both times our players didn’t have to break a sweat. More of the same this time? The Obvious Dangermen – Stjepan Plazonja and Dejan Racic I referred to this guy as the SPL Podolski from the first time I started researching on him for the first preview article and all that I’ve seen so far has reinforced that opinion. It is genuinely impressive how powerful and direct he is on the left flank. Plazonja has 8 goals and 7 assists from Hougang’s 16 games so far, which works out to about a goal contribution per game. Truly impressive considering Hougang is a pretty goal-shy team. Of course of his 8 goals, 7 have been on his left foot, with the remaining goal taken on his right foot. We’ll go a long way if we can show him onto his right foot – but I’m guessing every team in the league knows that and still finds it incredibly difficult to stop. If Plazonja is the threat from the left, then Dejan Racic is absolutely the dangerman in front. With 12 goals he is the top-scorer in Hougang, and he profits a lot from Plazonja’s exploits down the left. 2 goals off his head, 3 on his left foot, and 7 on his right foot proves he is a versatile finisher, and we have to stop the service to him. The Return of Shahdan Sulaiman The last time we played Hougang, Shahdan was playing, but he was nowhere near his best as we easily demolished Hougang 7-1. That was 3 months ago when he just came back from injury, though, and in recent games we’ve seen him go back to his usual self. He has 1 goal and 3 assists this season, but more importantly, he has brought back some midfield presence to this Hougang team, which has added another dimension to the team – instead of just their usual long ball from the back. We’re gonna have to keep Shahdan quiet in midfield, and this seems like a game fit for someone like Song Ui-Young to play, because of his physicality, which may help to upset Shahdan’s rhythm a little. The Table Doesn’t Lie With all the nice stuff I said about Hougang in the above two sections, it would seem like I am predicting a really difficult game for the Sailors. However, despite the recent resurgence, Hougang still lie second from bottom, only above Tanjong Pagar United. Also, they are still goal-shy and the list of scorers is not a diverse one. Shut down Racic and shut down Plazonja and we should be fine. Conclusion I wonder if Coach Ranko will rotate again, given that we have a tough away trip in 5 days’ time against Persib, Whatever it is, I hope we have enough strength either in our starting XI or on the bench to save the game should it not go according to plan. COME ON YOU BOYS IN BLUE! My predicted line-up Izwan Mahbud Hafiz Nor, Lionel Tan, Bailey Wright, Toni Datkovic, Chris van Huizen Song Ui-Young, Hami Syahin Maxime Lestienne, Lennart Thy, 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! 3 points for exact scoreline predicted correctly, 2 points for predicting the winner and margin of victory correctly (but not the exact scoreline), and 1 point for predicting the outcome correctly (win, lose or draw). Eddy’s prediction: Sailors 4 Hougang 2 Joseph’s prediction: Sailors 6 Hougang 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!

Again, I take a bit of a backseat this time as Joseph Chin (not to be mistaken with Joseph Jireh) very helpfully did all of the heavy lifting for this article, and I am very grateful. I present to you his lowdown on Port FC, and will then add on some of my thoughts and predictions at the end. The Lowdown on Port FC The Name Why are they named Port? A tribute to the Portuguese wine usually paired with dessert? Or are they located by the sea? Well, Port FC are founded and sponsored by the Port Authority of Thailand, and are one of the oldest clubs in the country. They had some initial successes in the 1960s before their current post-millenium golden era. The Port Authority of Thailand Stadium doesn’t pass muster for AFC competitions, so this match will be held in BG Stadium, familiar surroundings for our former player Irfan Fandi (Home United in 2016 and 2017), who just last season was part of the BG Pathum side who plays their matches there. Asian Pedigree Port FC faced Geylang United (aka International) in the 2010 AFC Cup Group Stage. The Eagles drew 2-2 away but lost 1-0 in Singapore. Port FC then managed to go all the way to the quarter-finals before they lost out to Kuwaiti team Qadsia SC. More recently, they had their best campaign in 2021 when they beat a weakened Guangzhou twice. Playoff round losses to Ulsan and Zhejiang in 2021/2022 and 2023/2024 meant they didn’t qualify for the Champions League again. The Man at the Helm Rangsan Viwatchaichok. Young rising manager who won the treble with Buriram in 2011 as a player, and served his original club BEC/Police Tero with distinction both as a player and manager. The former left back/defensive mid was capped 29 times for Thailand. Interestingly, he has played for Geylang United before from 2006 to 2007, and he holds the record for most appearances in the Thai League 1 with 439 appearances. Some Dangermen to Look Out For Port FC look fairly stacked from their recent recruitment drive, so here’s some players to keep an eye out for. Irfan Fandi: For the first time in continental competition, we face a Singaporean doing well overseas. With Isaac Honny (Ghana) and Noboru Shimura (Japan) also in contention at CB, their defence might be a tough one to break down, [Editor’s note – Think Noboru Shimura might be injured, he came off injured during the match against Buriram FC a fewe weeks ago] Frans Putros: Denmark born Iraqi CB/RB who was out injured before his callup against Oman in the recent international window. Recovered well enough to be on the bench against Prachuap last week. He also represented Denmark at the youth levels before being capped for Iraq 19 times. Asnawi Muangkalam: This name will be familiar to all Singapore fans, for what he did to Faris Ramli after he missed a penalty playing against Indonesia. What better way to avenge (then Sailor) Faris’s AFF Cup debacle when Shawal zips past the troll at full back and scores a long ranger (either by himself or have Maxime bend it in like against Zhejiang). and give him the ultimate back-handed compliment by (not) celebrating it in his face. Willen Mota: A familiar face since our encounters with BUTD last season. Last seen coming out as a super sub to score the late winner against Persib. Might end up going for the same trick again to catch our tired Sailors in defence when Felipe Amorim is subbed out. Bordin Phala: A mainstay for Port at club since 2018, and a scourge for our NT at various big tournaments (but thankfully not scored against our national team). A tricky winger who poses a threat himself, or when laying on the assists for his teammates, as you can see above. Playing Style Rangsan generally sets his teams up in a 4-3-3 formation, although he sometimes switches to a 3-4-3 or a 4-2-3-1. Against Persib, he opted for a rare 3-5-1-1. And that’s the Lowdown by Joseph Chin! Away Woes Set to Continue? I don’t quite know what it is, but our Sailors seem to be a completely different team when we play at home vs when we play away. It won’t help that Port is probably one of the strongest teams we will face this season. If you look at all our opponents, I think besides Buriram, no other team comes even close to the quality Port has. Buriram and Port of course, also benefit from playing in a much faster-paced league. As the saying goes – “iron sharpens iron”. Playing week in week out in a league of much higher intensity will mean that our Sailors will have to hang in there for long periods in this game. We will need to “suffer” before we can even think of playing our football. Before the match against CAHN, I hoped that we would do better than we did against Borneo. We can all see how that turned out. One thing that struck me about the CAHN game is how much faster the Vietnamese players looked compared to us, and we might see the same again tonight. They are 2nd in the table, behind the Buriram juggernaut. A few weeks ago, they managed to eke out a 0-0 draw against Buriram, while last week they fell 2-1 to fellow challengers BG Pathum. Do not be fooled by their recent run of form in the league, where they are winless in 4. They are still dominating games, and even in their loss against BG Pathum, they were far and away the better team, and made BG Pathum look like a mid-table team. A combination of poor finishing, bad luck and occasional bad defending has led to this run, but I believe it is nothing more than a slight blip for them. Conclusion I cannot in good conscience predict that our Sailors can go up there and

The 5-0 scoreline is a haunting one. To concede that number of goals, and to not even score 1 – it’s not a great day out whether you’re a player or a supporter. Unfortunately, we’ve done it twice this season. In Hanoi, the Crew found some time for gallows humour and started chanting “Lima Kosong” as we exited the stadium. Lol. While CAHN is a good team in a good league and you can half-explain it away as a bad day at the office against superior opposition, there can be no such excuses for losing 5-0 to Tampines Rovers. It was so, so poor. The last time we lost 5-0, we picked ourselves up and responded a few days later with a big win against Young Lions, so here’s hoping we can do similar this time round. Let’s dive into some pre-match thoughts. Tampines Not in the Best of Form Oh dear me, the last time I wrote about a team not being on form, it was CAHN and see what they did to us! At the risk of jinxing it though, I am gonna stick to my guns here. Tampines are on a run of 5 matches without a win, and have lost their last 2. It seems that their packed schedule might be getting to them as well, both in terms of fatigue and rotation. They left out Faris and Glenn in their match against Young Lions with an eye on the Bangkok United game in midweek, and they didn’t really get going until both of them were subbed on, eventually clawing back a 2-goal deficit. Unluckily for us this time, it is us who do not have the benefit of a week’s rest and training before the game, as Tampines did not have any midweek games this time round. You can thus be sure that their A-team, including Faris and Glenn will play, and we will need to be wary of their threat. Tampines play a very good brand of football, but it seems that the blueprint to beat/hold them has been repeatedly put on show in the previous few games. Just stay tight at the back, and hit them on the counter-attack. Luckily for us, that’s exactly what we like to do, so I think this is where we might capitalise. As for staying solid at the back, two big questions pop up ahead of this match. First, do we stick with 3 centre-backs at the back, or do we go with 2? Second, is Ranko gonna swap keeper like the last time he did when we lost 5-0 and our keeper made an error? How Many at the Back? Ok you have 5 seconds to decide which you would do if you were Coach Ranko. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Ok I’d prefer if we go with 3 centre-backs at the back for the added solidity. I wonder what the fans think, and I don’t think there is a right answer for this. But here’s why I prefer 5 at the back. First, 4 at the back means Lionel Tan at right-back. I am not super convinced with that, but I don’t feel like there’s better options as well. We all saw Hafiz Nor’s defensive deficiencies against CAHN, while Chris van Huizen also endured a tough time in Hanoi. We desperately need Mamat back, don’t we! If you look at the 5-0 game against Tampines again, we looked good and solid for the 45min, but were undone the moment someone stepped out of the compact backline. Datkovic tried to guess where Irfan Najeeb’s pass was going, and he squeezed up without the other 2 centrebacks following his line. This left a gaping hole for Boris Kopitovic to exploit, and that he did with aplomb. After that, came the dreadful Zharfan error, and as a result of that, he didn’t play for us in the 9 games after. But the defensive performance in the first half was not at all bad. We limited Tampines to very few chances. Where it got disastrous for me, is in the second half, when Lionel was taken off and we moved to a back 4. Suddenly, Faris and Glenn had the time of their lives. Glenn killed Carmona on the left flank to get the crucial 3rd goal, while Faris was left with all the space in the world to curl in a great 4th goal from the left wing. Given that we have been playing with this system against better opponents in the ACL, ACL2, and the Shopee Cup, I think we will continue sticking with it against Tampines, a sign that we take them seriously. Interestingly, in the SPL, the first time we played 5 at the back was against Tampines as well, while our last SPL game against Balestier Khalsa also saw us going back to a back 5. We did not play this formation for the rest of our games – as far as I can remember. I think there is a good reason for playing against better teams with 5 at the back. For all the qualities our Sailors players have, one thing I feel we lack is the ability to cover large spaces while defending. We look so much more solid when we have 3 centre-backs on the pitch. Against teams like Tanjong Pagar, we can get away with anything at the back, but I think against Tampines, it might be wise to stay solid, and hit them on the transitions, which is their weak point. Do We Switch the Keeper? This is a tough one. I think swapping keepers after they make an error is not something I’d do as a coach. Mistakes happen. I wasn’t a fan of Zharfan being dropped for his error, although I do feel it was a decision made not just because of his one error. He had looked a little unconvincing this season in some games when coming out to claim crosses, and Izwan is just

I must confess two things first before you read this preview. First, I am typing this barely hours before I fly off to Hanoi and so the research is unlikely to be great. I have not packed either – I am starting to get used to this routine of having to clear as much work as I can before I fly off to support the Sailors in whatever part of the world. My suitcase-packing skills have greatly improved though! Chuck, chuck, chuck, chuck, in and out in 10min. Second, I don’t know a lot about V-League football, besides knowing that Vietnamese players, particularly those who play for the national team, are of a pretty high quality. And with that disclaimer out of the way, let’s talk about why CAHN are probably a good team, but there is no better time to play them. Their Season Just Started Unlike our Sailors, who are thick in the middle of our season, CAHN’s season is barely 3 games old, 1 win in the Shopee Cup, 1 draw and 1 loss in the V-League. While their win against a second-string (but still strong) Buriram United is impressive, they looked very lacklustre in their domestic games. A possible reason for this is that their new signings are still gelling. After all, it takes time for players to settle, and get used to each other. Maxime Lestienne was not an overnight sensation when he joined us – he too, took a while before becoming this absolute machine that he is now. Another possible reason is match fitness – perhaps they really just need a run of games to get going. I am sure you will remember how our own Sailors started this season as well – the articles were very similar. Each article talked about how the Sailors were winning but unconvincing. Perhaps CAHN is going through the same thing too. And then perhaps because of this need to gel, if you take a look at the highlights of their two league games so far, they look far from convincing in defence. Many times the defence is caught flat-footed, and they are just staring at each other, waiting for the other defenders to take action. This is hopefully something we can capitalise on. Not as Many Foreign Players V-League rules dictate that teams can only use up to 3 foreign players and 2 naturalised Vietnamese in domestic games. As such, you see that their squad contains only 4 foreign players. Jason Pendant may look like a foreign name but he has a Vietnamese mother, and when you realise his full name is Jason Pendant Quang Vinh, it starts sounding a lot more Vietnamese, don’t it. To make matters worse for them, Grafite, their hero on Matchday 1 against Buriram sustained an injury and will not be available for this game. So, we have more foreigners than them in our squad, and I think the better foreigners as well, if you just compare CVs. This should help to counter the advantage that CAHN FC has when it comes to the standard of the local players. Vietnam > Singapore is my simplistic analysis of this of course. The Vietnamese Players We are a bit lucky that star defender Doan Van Hau (19 caps for Vietnam) is injured for this one and doesn’t look likely to play. But he’s definitely not the biggest star in the squad. Foreigner or local, it doesn’t matter, the shining star of this team is the Vietnamese Messi, Nguyen Quang Hai. Captain of the team, the little magician has a wand of a left foot, and stands at 1.68m tall, so you can already see why the comparisons to Messi exist. Despite his height, he is a huge figure in Vietnamese football and Vietnam, in general. His recent marriage to Vietnamese influencer Chu Thanh Huyen was widely covered in Vietnam, and only served to boost his celebrity status. His career seems to have not hit the heights that some have predicted in the past. Look at this list of achievements. Superb achievements, but you will notice a distinct lack of accolades after 2021. His career has stalled a little, after his move to Pau FC, a French Ligue 2 side. That spell wasn’t as successful as his fans would have hoped, and he will now be looking to impress after coming back to the V-League. In the games this season, he has shown his creativity and consistent delivery. He already notched one assist, and but for poor finishing from his teammates, could easily have had a couple more. He is certainly the dangerman and we would do well to stop service to him, and from him. Rest and Rotation Having seen our lineup in the last game against Balestier Khalsa, it is pretty clear that Coach Ranko treats the Shopee Cup seriously, and is preserving the likes of Maxime Lestienne, Lennart Thy and Bart Ramselaar for this game. This might work to our advantage as well, because CAHN FC had to grind hard over the weekend with their first team, and still ended up losing to Thanh Hoa FC. The legs might just be feeling a little heavy heading into this one. Conclusion The official preview written by the club is fantastic, and I highly recommend checking it out. We are abit pampered in that the club really puts in effort to deliver such quality content, so we should definitely appreciate that. The preview does talk a lot about CAHN coach Mano Polking perhaps having a lot of knowledge about the Singaporean players due to his long stint as coach for the Thailand national team. While that may be true, I am optimistic still, considering all the reasons above. Let’s just not play like how we did in Borneo please. COME ON YOU BOYS IN BLUE! My predicted line-up Izwan Mahbud Hafiz Nor, Lionel Tan, Bailey Wright, Toni Datkovic, Obren Kljajic Hariss Harun, Hami Syahin Maxime Lestienne, Lennart Thy, Bart Ramselaar Score Prediction

After a hard-fought 2-0 victory on Thursday, rotation is gonna be the name of the game this weekend as we take on Balestier Khalsa, one of the most entertaining sides in the league. They are in 4th place, and come into this game unbeaten in 6, winning and drawing 3 each. On paper this is a going to be a difficult game, so let’s dive straight into some pre-match thoughts. Attacking Prowess It is no secret that Balestier don’t really have trouble scoring goals. With 46 goals scored, they have the 3rd-best offensive record in the league, second only to Geylang’s 52 and Sailors’ 49. Kodai Tanaka leads the way for them with 15 goals, but as you can probably tell, the goals are well spread out. Ismail Sassi has 12 goals, Ignatius Ang has 5, Riku Fukashiro has 4, and Alen Kozar has 4. This is a team that has multiple routes to goal, unlike Geylang, where if you stop Tomoyuki Doi, you probably shut them down entirely. This difference with Geylang is especially stark when you consider that in the last few games, Kodai Tanaka has struggled to find the net. In the last 3 games where Balestier have plundered a total of 12 goals, Kodai does not have a single goal to his name. However, in those games, he has 4 assists, and has been part of a free-flowing attack. I am sure he wants to be back on the scoresheet soon, but till that happens, at least he will feel like he’s contributing. His 4 assists takes his season total to 8 assists, which is very impressive considering he is the striker and is expected to bang in the goals. If you watch Balestier games you will notice also that even though he is the main striker, he has no qualms dropping out to the wings in order to receive the passes and help to stretch the play, and eventually cross the ball in. This shows he’s truly a team player and is willing to do whatever is necessary for the team to win. We would do well not to over-commit to merely take care of Kodai. He is well capable of creating for his teammates too. No Madhu, Welcome Back Tajeli In the previous match against DPMM, Madhu rather harshly saw red for an elbow to the DPMM opponent’s face. Bad news for him, but great news for us. Not only is Madhu an integral part of their defence, he also has scored once and assisted 5 times this season. For context, Alen Kozar has 4, and Riku Fukashiro has 6, so he is right smack in between. He also has that ability to put shivers down the spines of many a supporter whenever he lines up for a long throw. Tajeli is eligible to play this game because he has already served out his suspension for a violent attack on an opponent two months ago. Will he come straight in? Will Coach de Roo continue to punish him for his ill behaviour? Whatever it is and whoever it is that starts in the middle, the defence will not be as good as it was before, and we have to capitalise on this unfamiliarity. How to Rotate? I am sure right now, Anu will be kicking himself, wondering why he got himself sent off so unnecessarily last week. Maybe it’s the curse of Jurong East – bad things always happen to Anu there. As it stands, he is not available for us for a number of games, and it is a crucial absence particularly because Rui Pires also seems to have a hand injury. He was spotted at JBS having his hand wrapped up in a bandage of sorts, and while it doesnt’ look too serious, the fact that he didn’t play any part in the wiin against Zhejiang, and the quick turnaround makes us wonder about his injury status going into this game. That leaves Hariss and Hami in the middle, because Adam Swandi is also going through some health scare of his own. We are not privy to information about the players the way that the coaching staff do, so we can only guess that it might be too soon for Adam Swandi to help out also. Of course, there is soome worry. Should Hariss or Hami be overplayed, then they might put themselves at risk of injury, and we really cannot afford to lose any midfielders. Conclusion A short one today because of the rushed schedule – SailorFanTalk needs squad rotation too haha. An important game in a packed schedule for us – the one thing I would say about our opponents is they don’t like to sit back and hold everyone behind the ball, so perhaps we will have space to thrive on in the counter-attack. That may lead to goals for us. Hopefully it plays out that way. COME ON YOU BOYS IN BLUE! My predicted line-up Izwan Mahbud Lionel Tan, Bailey Wright, Toni Datkovic, Obren Kljajic Rui Pires, Bart Ramselaar, Hami Syahin Abdul Rasaq, Shawal Anuar, Song Ui-Young 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! 3 points for exact scoreline predicted correctly, 2 points for predicting the winner and margin of victory correctly (but not the exact scoreline), and 1 point for predicting the outcome correctly (win, lose or draw). Eddy’s prediction: Sailors 3 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!

I take a bit of a backseat this time as Joseph Chin (not to be mistaken with Joseph Jireh) very helpfully did all of the heavy lifting for this article, and I am very grateful. I present to you his lowdown on Zhejiang Professional, and will then add on some of my thoughts and predictions at the end. The Lowdown on Zhejiang Professional The Name What’s up with that name? Zhejiang Professional? Why does it sound so technical and boring? No exciting explanation, really. They were actually made to rename (via government decree) from Hangzhou Greentown, hence the bland and rather unwieldy name Zhejiang Professional. You’ll notice that Guangzhou Evergrande is also not Guangzhou Evergrande anymore, they are just Guangzhou FC. Government did not want football clubs to have corporate names in their name. Greentown is not a place, it is a company’s name. They are property developers, and remain owners of the club despite significant budget cuts. The History They were a yoyo-team whose 4th placed finish in 2010 remains a rare highlight of a generally mediocre track record until Jordi Vinyals, their current manager, took over. Former players include Asian Pedigree First appearing in 2011 ACL, Nagoya Grampus lost there to Hangzhou but their poor away form in Japan, Korea (against FC Seoul) and UAE (Al Ain) meant they ended in 4th place. The next time they returned to the ACL was in 2023, after being relegated from CSL in 2016 and exiled there until 2022. The underdogs punched above their weight with home wins against Buriram United (that ended in an infamous brawl, more on that later) and Ventforet Kofu. Yet again their indifferent away form proved to be their undoing, though a creditable draw against Melbourne City was the reason why the Aussies couldn’t reach the next round. The Man at the Helm Jordi Vinyals. He is a former Barcelona B player, who also spent time with (then) lower division clubs Real Betis and Villarreal. Bounced around in the lower leagues in Spain as a manager until making his name in China with the now-defunct Qingdao Huanghai and then Zhejiang. At least in China, his teams’ nearly 60% win rate in Qingdao and Hangzhou are based on a tendency to score a lot of goals and do things with a solid rather than spectacular squad with limited resources. Some Dangermen to Look Out for Leonardo: Thankfully he is not around to wreak havoc on our defence. The brawl against Buriram saw one of the main instigators of the fight hit with an 8-match ban, which means he can only be used domestically for this season. For the same reason, Yao Junsheng and Dong Yu are banned for the first few matches of ACL2 this season. Leonardo has 18 goals and 4 assists this season for Zhejiang, and is far and away their top-scorer. Franko Andrijasevic: 3 caps for Croatia, will be pulling strings in the middle of the park together / alternating with Cheng Jin (whose appearance with the PRC NT last week was restricted to the bench) Jean Evrard Kouassi: 9 caps for Ivory Coast, was on the longlist for the AFCON in 2023. Impressed with Hajduk Split and CSL rivals Shanghai Port and Wuhan Zall. Also had a forgettable dry spell in Turkey. Versatile across the frontline, one of the few world class players in the team and the main attacking threat. While he only has 5 goals this season, he leads the teams in assists, and is their biggest threat. Alexander N’doumbou: AKA Qian Jiegei, the half-Chinese Gabonese midfielder once represented Gabon for 14 matches. Having renounced it for Chinese citizenship, he is out of international football but remains a key cog in his China career with Shanghai Shenhua and then Zhejiang given his European credentials. Deabeas Owusu: Former Ajax youth player whose unusual route to China (via Estonia) helped somehow to revive a flagging career at 24 years old. Have to fill the big shoes of the suspended Leonardo and the prolific Zimbabwean striker Nyasha Mushkewi (who has left the club). And that’s the Lowdown by Joseph Chin! Sailors Need to Improve After that pretty detailed breakdown by Joseph of our opponents tomorrow, I’ll now give you some of my thoughts. I think this goes without saying, but we must do better than we did against Borneo. Till today I am not sure what that performance was – was it tactics? Tiredness? Bit of both? We looked so passive, and so out of ideas, and we couldn’t string any passes together. It was a genuinely worrying performance, even taking the poorness of the pitch into account. There was a bit of a break after the 2-2 draw against Geylang International some weeks back, and I think and hope that the staff had time to figure out what the problem was. Whether it’s been solved, we don’t know because we put out a very different lineup against Tanjong Pagar United. Coach Rankovic admitted after the game that it was due to rotation, so I don’t think any of us should expect to see the same lineup come tomorrow evening. As always, the proof is in the pudding, so let us all be judges of whether any improvement has been made. I hope that especially at home, we see our team go for it a bit more, and not be so tentative in attack. Maxime had some big words to say in the official club interview, let’s hope the team backs it up with some good play on the pitch. Zhejiang Not In the Best Shape It won’t have escaped notice that even though some might say that recent Sailors form has been unconvincing, Zhejiang’s is even worse. They have lost more than half their games, have a negative goal difference, and their 50 goals conceded is the 2nd-worst defensive record in the entire league. Their form in the past 2 mths? 4 losses, 1 draw, and 1 win. If there’s ever an

That’s a sad title, isn’t it? Amazingly, despite missing our chance to go top last week, tonight presents another chance for our Sailors to do so. For that to happen, we’ll need to beat Geylang, and hope that somehow Tampines fails to take all three points when they face Hougang. The latter is highly unlikely, despite Hougang’s recent resurgence in form, but depressingly, I am going to predict that our Sailors won’t be able to pick up all three points against Geylang anyway. Let’s dive right into the preview. Lack of Rotation Costing Us Rotation is a word I have mentioned quite a few times this season in preview articles. Why I have been banging that drum repeatedly is because I feared that the fixture congestion coming up would lead to tired performances and worse, injuries. Of the 12 games played in the league so far, all 12 have seen Maxime Lestienne starting. I know he’s our biggest star, and he leads the Sailors both in goals and assists, but surely we can’t keep playing him and still expect his performances to be top-notch week in week out? To make things worse, sometimes we find ourselves in a comfortable lead, and still persist in leaving him on the pitch – as we did for the entirety of the 7-1 thrashing of Hougang. Can we not trust our bench options earlier on in games when we are already comfortably leading? Can we consider leaving him out of the team if we’re playing Tanjong Pagar for example? What does it say about us if we cannot be confident of beating Tanjong Pagar without Maxime in the side? Questions for us to think about. To make matters worse, not trusting your bench players also then means that when they do need to step up and contribute, they lack rhythm. When Anu and Adam Swandi come on nowadays, I don’t feel they are anything like what I remember of them as players. Is it a physical issue? Mental issue? Frankly I don’t know. Moving forward, I hope Coach Ranko balances out the workload a little more. I shudder to think what will happen to our team should Maxime sustain a bad injury. Touchwood. All of you reading this please touch wood as well. Datkovic Injury Datkovic is a tough guy – and so for him to lie on the ground wincing in pain after a collision with Hassan Sunny must have meant he was in a lot of pain. There is talk about the injury being a fractured rib, while some others say it’s a bruised rib. If it’s a fracture, then he’ll be out for at least a month. Fingers crossed. It’s a real shame because I feel he has settled into the team really well. He is assured in defence, useful in build-up, and also a penalty-box threat at the other end during setpieces. He is also the only left-footed centre-back option that we have, so this is a big blow to us, because it has an effect on how we play out from the back. The Toni-Bailey partnership has been an integral part of the defence that has conceded the second-least number of goals in the SPL this season. Toni’s injury means we will likely see a partnership that is largely untested, Bailey + Lionel, or Bailey + Hariss. This thus has further knock-on effects as to the midfield options that we have. All in all, a big blow to have Toni out for so long. Bailey was also left out of the squad for the loss to Albirex, with sources stating he suffered a concussion during the Borneo game. Fingers crossed he can make it back for this game – we’ll need all the bodies we can get. Geylang Always Give Us a Tough Time I was a little surprised when I checked the head-to-head results between Geylang and the Sailors in the past few meetings. I was expecting to see Geylang taking points off us left right and centre, but surprisingly we actually won all 3 games against Geylang in 2023, and the only bad result was the 1-1 draw earlier this season. Of course, there’s a reason for why I had that impression, and I suspect some other Sailors fans will have that impression too. First, it’s because we remember 2022 all too well, when we faced Geylang 4 times, and only managed 1 win. Even leaving aside the results, Noor Ali has set his side up well against us in the past few years, so much so that even if we do win, it isn’t exactly convincing. I am sure you will remember the 2-1 win over them when we needed a pair of Lestienne freekicks to bail us out – we were completely impotent in attack that day, and defensively we had to rely on a Mamat masterclass to stop Geylang from increasing their lead. This season’s game also saw Geylang completely grab hold of the impetus in the first half, and they scored after Bezecourt capitalised on a Hariss error. They do very well to stop us playing out of the back and building in any meaningful fashion, so we can expect more of the same this time. Tomoyuki Doi The man’s a machine. Even when Geylang are playing like crap, he scores. He’s now on 20 goals for the season, and to put things into context, that’s about half of Geylang’s goals (45), and more than the numbers of goals scored by Tanjong Pagar (15), DPMM (19). It is also equal to the number of goals scored by Young Lions and Hougang United, while only one less than that scored by Albirex (21). It is just insane. And he takes them from everywhere too. While he is a potent penalty-box finisher, 5 of his 20 goals were taken from outside the box as well, meaning you can’t just sit off him as well. With the Sailors defence in flux – I am not

It was 7-1 last time out against the White Swans as they meekly surrendered in that game. A combination of poor form and terribly naive tactics by King Kazu meant that our Sailors managed to hit them on transitions again and again and again. And again. It was terribly cathartic for Sailors fans, considering all the damage they have done to us over the years. Watch the highlights here again if you so wish. Are we likely to do a repeat of it? I don’t think so. More Pragmatic Albirex Since King Kazu got the sack, I think the truth finally dawned on Albirex that this season’s team was not very good. Not only was it not a championship-contending team, it is actually a team that would struggle to survive relegation (if there was such a concept in the SPL). They’ve since amended their style to be a lot more pragmatic, staying solid and compact and trying to hit teams on the counter with the pace of Daniel Goh and Shingo Nakano. Their last result was a 0-0 draw, the first time in 2 years that a goalless draw has been seen in the SPL. They managed to limit the effervescent attacking trio of DPMM, something that Geylang International failed to do earlier this evening. A part of this was perhaps due to the return of veteran midfielder Yojiro Takahagi, who managed to exert some control in midfield. This, coupled with Syed Firdaus Hassan’s return to midfield meant that Albirex were harder to break down than they usually are this season. Nakano – One to Fear When I first heard that Albirex were signing a kid who played college football in the USA, I thought to myself, wow how desperate could they be? But credit to them, what a masterstroke it has turned out to be. With raw energy, pace and athleticism, he has really proven to be the difference for Albirex. Since the Sailors game, he has struck 6 times in 7 games. He has 8 goals and 1 assist this season, making it 0.9 goals per game. For reference, Maxime is on 0.84, Shawal is on 0.89 and Lennart is on 0.69. Of his goals, he has also shown he is rather versatile – scoring with left foot, right foot, and his head. The last time we played him, he hadn’t fully settled in yet (though the same can be said of Lennart Thy who was still being criticised by some fans despite us racking up 7 goals). If we can stop the supply to Nakano, we can probably keep Albirex quiet tomorrow evening. Will Sailors Bounce Back with a Strong Side? Or Will they Rotate? A 3-0 loss to Borneo FC has gotta be slightly demoralising. And when you lose, your legs feel that bit heavier. You can play games every 3 days and if you’re winning each one comfortably, you might still feel that spring in your step. Does Coach Ranko rotate for this one, given that Albirex are one of the weaker teams in the SPL, and giving some key players a chance to get their legs back before the Geylang game on Friday? I think he won’t make wholesale changes, but I believe some regulars will come in. Shawal and Hariss I can see them starting given that they didn’t start in midweek. Rui Pires, given his early sending-off, should probably start as well. Should Obren be available, then the foreigner quota comes into the equation again. Does Coach Ranko drop one of our two foreign centre-backs to allow Obren to play? Conclusion Whatever lineup is put out, we absolutely have to beat this season’s version of Albirex. Let’s put the midweek disappointment behind us and go top of the table (Tampines don’t play this weekend). COME ON YOU BOYS IN BLUE! My predicted line-up Izwan Mahbud Lionel Tan, Bailey Wright, Toni Datkovic, Chris van Huizen Rui Pires, Adam Swandi, Hariss Harun Maxime Lestienne, Lennart Thy, Shawal Anuar 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! 3 points for exact scoreline predicted correctly, 2 points for predicting the winner and margin of victory correctly (but not the exact scoreline), and 1 point for predicting the outcome correctly (win, lose or draw). Eddy’s prediction: Albirex 1 Sailors 3 Joseph’s prediction: Albirex 0 Sailors 3 Written by Eddy Hirono Picture courtesy of Lion City Sailors 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!