BoLASEPaKO•COM - A Blog on Singapore Football

Singapore coach Tsutomu Ogura   It is not uncommon to hear the chorus of disapproval from the masses after any less-than-convincing performance from the Singapore national football team . The same thing happened after the Lions concluded their friendly fixtures of late against Myanmar and Chinese Taipei at the National Stadium . Using these two fixtures as a final tuning up before the biennial showpiece, the Asean Championship , aka AFF Mitsubishi Electric Cup (AFF ME Cup), Coach Tsutomu Ogura prioritised experimenting with some new tactics and formations, which resulted in a scrappy 3-2 win over the "Chinthe" before succumbing to their third defeat to the Blue Wings on the same scoreline since 2017. A SCRAPPY WIN OVER MYANMAR Understandably, the performances from these two fixtures aren't convincing enough to suggest the four-time Asean champions are ready for the bigger test. Apart from the first half against the Myanmarese, when the Lions took an early lead from F...

The poor performance of Jaguars cannot be tolerated. It is such an appalling sight to see the recent performance of the once-mighty Tanjong Pagar United . Put it bluntly, do the Jaguars still remember they are playing in the top-tier league of this country? One may be forgiven if you occupy the last spot of the ladder, but one cannot be forgiven if efforts on the field failed to convince the others of your determination to turn things around. It was not hard for the critics to come after them again after the recent 6-0 loss to Hougang United , their nearest rivals on the ladder prior to the 1st November fixture. As the league heads for a long recess after this week, Tanjong Pagar United remain the only team in the nine-team league to accumulate single-digit points (8) with only two wins, two draws, and fourteen defeats in the ninth spot. The eighth-placed Young Lions (at the time of writing) already collected 18 points out of the 17 games played. Any layman could easily tell some of th...

Bedok Stadium - former home of Geylang International  The Singapore Premier League (SPL) faces significant challenges due to the limited availability of dedicated stadiums for its clubs. As the stadiums used for SPL matches are also shared by age-group competitions and lower-tier leagues (with some Island Wide League matches scheduled at school fields), this inevitably causes wear and tear on the playing surfaces, which could endanger players' safety and impact the quality of play, making it difficult to maintain competitive standards. Following the uprooting of some clubs from the stadiums where they were once based, it has become increasingly difficult for these SPL clubs to conduct meaningful community outreach within the localities they are meant to identify with. For instance, Geylang International, which used to call Bedok Stadium home until the end of the 2018 season, now plays at Jalan Besar Stadium while their designated home ground at Our Tampines Hub undergoes repairi...

Lions Head Coach Tsutomu Ogura The Singapore national team wrapped up their training camp in Japan with one win and two defeats to the J1 clubs they sparred with. Apart from the 2-1 victory over Tokyo Verdy, the club where Lions coach Tsutomo Ogura worked as assistant manager prior to his appointment to the current role in early February, the four-time Asean champions succumbed to heavy losses to FC Tokyo (4-0) and Yokohama F. Marinos (7-1). PREPARING FOR THE AFF MITSUBISHI ELECTRIC CUP The motive of the camp is to gear the team up for the upcoming AFF Mitsubishi Electric Cup , which is scheduled to commence on 8 December. The outcome of these friendlies should not be surprising, given the wide gulf in footballing standards between the Republic and Asia's number one. REALITY CHECK FOR THE LIONS This notion was fittingly expressed by Coach Ogura in his assessment with The Straits Times when he told the broadsheet: "Before this, they (Singapore) had a feeling of how big the g...