ASEAN Cup Diary: Day 9
Let the chaos of the final matchday begins!
Ahhh…It is finally here. The final matchday of the ASEAN Cup. Chaos will ensue, dramas will take place, clashes will be unavoidable. It is group A’s turn first up with three teams still in the race for the second place spot.
Singapore is in the driving seat with 6 points and all they need is to not lose against Malaysia in order to qualify for the semi-final. Meanwhile, Malaysia will need to win and hope that Cambodia does not upset Thailand and outscore them to advance. For Cambodia, their destiny is not in their hands as they face a Thailand side who are hoping to lock that top spot of the group in their control. Even though a win is required, they will also need Malaysia to not win or win while scoring less goals than they can.
Malaysia 0-0 Singapore
It seemed like Malaysia headed out with a very strong lineup, with a lot of their naturalised players like midfielders (#8) Stuart Wilkin, (#10) Endrick, (#16) Ezequiel Agüero, or full-backs (#4) Daniel Ting and (#2) Declan Lambert all started for the host. The thing that surprised me, however, was that manager Pau Martí decided to go with (#7) Haqimi Azim to play up front instead of choosing either (#9) Darren Lok, (#17) Paulo Josué, or (#22) Fergus Tierney even though all three were decent in previous matches. Other than that, no major surprises in Malaysia’s starting lineup.
For Singapore, a lot of their key players were rested for this game as manager Tsutomu Ogura made a number of changes. Players like full-back (#3) Ryhan Stewart, midfielders (#7) Kyogo Nakamura and (#9) Glenn Kweh, and, most noticeably, striker (#20) Shawal Anuar were all on the bench. While (#8) Shahdan Sulaiman was back in the starting lineup, I was curious to see how Singapore would play with their almost rotated squad.
Interestingly, with Malaysia chose to retain their 3+2 build-up shape, Singapore also decided to go man-to-man with their pressing and their 4-2-3-1 formation just happened to be the perfect fit for them to do so. Though, it is also worth mentioning that when Singapore decided to go man-to-man, they were losing their numerical advantage with their backline having to mark five offensive players.
The host also looked to press very high up the pitch with the intention of preventing Singapore from playing out from the back, and it worked almost straight away as they managed to force a high turnover inside the first 5 minutes, but could not capitalise as the long shot was dealt with easily by Singapore keeper (#1) Izwan Mahbud. The away side did not seem to be fazed though, they still continued to play out from the back but took a slightly conservative approach to wait for Malaysian players to jump, which allowed them to make the pass through Malaysia’s pressing lanes to find the central midfielders.
The positioning of Singapore’s full-backs helped with this as they remained close to the touchline. This forced Malaysia’s wingers to also stay wide, creating a small channel between the winger and the striker for central midfielders (#6) Shah Shahiran and Shahdan Sulaiman to position themselves in and receive the ball from the centre-backs. This also gave them a solid rest defence as well as none of the defenders pushed forward and could take up a defensive position straight away when Singapore lost the ball. Very, very interesting build-up play from the away side.
A lot of passes were made through Malaysia’s defensive block and aimed towards either the attacking midfielder (#16) Hami Syahin and striker (#23) Abdul Rasaq Akeem. But even though a few of those passes were completed, both players usually got fouled right when they received the ball and resulted in free kicks that were very far away from Malaysia’s penalty box. As such, it was hard for Singapore to create any meaningful chances that could challenge the Malaysia keeper.
Same story for Malaysia as well. Their build-up was decent as they were able to free their full-backs for an overlapping run down to the byline. However, the crosses that came from the flanks could not do any harm as the Singaporean defenders managed to deal with them well or those shots did not challenge Mahbud much. The first half ended with a stalemate because of the lack of quality with the chances created by both teams, even though I was impressed with the quality of the build-up play.
Entering the second half and Malaysia seemed to have upped their tempo significantly, with more emphasis being placed on attacking and creating chances. This, subsequently, led to Singapore conceded more corners while Malaysia got closer and closer to finding a goal. But luck was not on their side with the chances that they had since quite a few of those chances somehow found the post or the crossbar. They have also brought on Josué and Tierney to bolster their attacking chances, which had helped to some extent, but not significant enough to beat Mahbud yet. Also interesting to note, but Singapore have also brought on their more experienced players like Stewart or Nakamura, probably with the hope that they could help closing down the game.
The host just looked like they panicked and tried any way possible to get the ball into the box, which included attacks down the wings and crosses into the box. They got a few more corners from those attempts, but none have been successfully converted so far. Added on to that was the frustration that the players felt as the second half advanced closer to the final minutes. Because Singapore seemed to have control of the situation and defended well, they shut out most of Malaysia’s attacks while also managed to waste a bit of time along the way.
Summary
With the lead going into the final matchday, it seemed no doubt that Singapore would advance through to the semi-final even with the waves of attack that Malaysia threw at them. However, the problem from the previous matches continued on to the final matchday as Malaysia still struggled to get the ball into the box even though it looked like they had a plan to play out from the back. Along with Singapore’s solid defensive block, the host could not take control of the match and luck was not on their side to help them advance through to the semi-final.
Thailand 3-2 Cambodia
With a semi-final spot already in hand and mathematically secured that top spot, Thailand rotated their squad once again and only left a few key players like right winger (#12) Nicholas Mickelson, defensive midfielder & captain (#19) William Weidersjö, and left winger (#11) Anan Yodsangwal in the starting lineup. On the other hand, Cambodia retained most of their key players in the lineup with the hope of causing an upset and tried to squeeze into second place while hoping Singapore would lost.
Cambodia’s 4-4-2 mid block looked quite promising early on as they managed to prevent Thailand from playing through the middle and guiding them out wide, where the away side would create an overload to stop Thailand’s wide players from progressing further into their half. They also had the courage to press the host inside of their own defensive third, though, they have not managed to generate any high turnover.
Thailand reacted to this by pushing their right full-back (#2) James Beresford high up the pitch and asking the right winger Mickelson to stay narrower and closer to the striker. Meanwhile in the build-up phase, their goalkeeper (#20) Kampol Pathomakkakul got involved along with the centre-backs while Weidersjö sat just behind Cambodia’s strikers to provide a passing option through Cambodia’s pressing lanes. With a structure that looked to match Cambodia’s defensive block one-to-one, this allowed for numerical superiority up front where the keeper could make a long pass in behind the opposition’s backline and players would attempt to make runs into the channels.
It was in the early minutes but Thailand already pushed a lot of players forward, that left them vulnerable to counter-attacks from Cambodia, and they were one of the better teams on that aspect. With a rest defence consisted of only two centre-backs and the left-back, Cambodia could have three or four players pouring forward and the host found it tough to contain the counter-attack. The only thing that saved them from conceding a goal was Cambodia’s lack of precision and composure in front of goal.
Also, Cambodia’s current main attacking outlet was left winger (#11) Nick Taylor as the team relied on his dribbles and crosses down the left-hand side. His pace also became useful for the away side’s counter attacks since he would lead the way and attempted to take on Thailand’s right-back while also held out for his teammates to join him. Along with striker (#10) Andrés Nieto, they have driven their team’s attacks on a few rare occasions that they had an opportunity to make a fast break. And it was Nieto himself, after a very rare Cambodia’s successful high press, who scored the opening goal. But it did not take long for Thailand to equalise with, literally, their next attack, where midfielder (#16) Akarapong Pumwisat pounced on the save that the Cambodia’s keeper did not manage to capture or deflect out of the way to score.
And there was Thailand’s main man, (#10) Suphanat Mueanta, came on the pitch after half time and looked to create threats down the right-hand side along with Mickelson, who now already moved back to the right-back position. With Suphanat and two more substitutes, Thailand looked different in the second half as their plan now changed to taking a risk to play through Cambodia’s defensive block to bait their players to move out of their positions. This opened up space in behind the away side’s backline and Thailand was hoping their players could run into that space to pick up passes. So far, however, Cambodia’s keeper (#22) Reth Ly Heng still held strong and kept his team in the game.
Once again, a single moment of losing concentration could lost them the lead and that was what Cambodia experienced. They lost the ball while trying to play out form the back, and this allowed the Thai attackers to create a short combination to send Akarapong through on goal and scored his second goal of the match. That goal also opened up the floodgate for Thailand to take control of the match, which they then received a few corner situations. One of them, through a good delivery to the far post, put centre-back (#5) Chalermsak Aukkee in an unmarked position to put the ball in the back of the net and also potentially locked in Thailand’s top spot in group A.
Cambodia tried to fight back in the late minutes of the game, which only opened up more space for Thailand to attack, but it gave them a lifeline back late into stoppage time when striker (#20) Kadel Coulibaly clawed one back for the away side. But that was just too late to snatch a point from Thailand as the home side secured the win at home and all three points on the final matchday.
Summary
It did not seem like a match that Thailand would lose even though Cambodia managed to do a bit of damage. They dominated and controlled the majority of the match, which helped them locked in a favourable result and confirmed their clash against the Philippines in the semi-final. Meanwhile, Cambodia should hold their heads high as their performance left me slightly surprised for what they can do in the future with improvements and more promising youngsters coming through.
You might notice that day 9 comes after day 10 on my agenda, and the reason was because I was not able to watch both matches live even though I planned to do so. Anyway, with day 9 out of the day, the coverage for the 2024 ASEAN Cup group stage has now been completed with only a single day missed. As we enter a short break between the group stage and the semi-final, I wish you a merry Christmas and a happy holidays! The coverage will return once the first leg of the semi-final finishes, so I will see you then.