So the stage is set again for another compelling AFC Champions League Elite Final, between two teams with massively contrasting styles and stories.
On one side, the giants of Jeddah, Al Ahli. The defending champions with a bevy of international stars at their disposal and a history to match.
On the other, the unheralded and, perhaps, controversial Machida Zelvia. The upstarts from Japan looking to upset the status quo, both in Japan and on the continent, with a style and approach that is divisive and uncharacteristic.
Our experts shared their views on this unique match-up on The Asian Game Podcast this week.
No room for complacency for Al Ahli – Mohammed Fayad
Even in Saudi there is a thing right now when it comes to Al Ahli fans, it’s like, guys, do not think that this is an easy game. I think overall, Al Ahli can do it but Al Ahli’s problems, whether (it’s) their game against Al Qadsiah, where they were 2-1 up and getting closer to Al Nassr and ended up conceding an injury time twice to lose. Whether it was losing the Intercontinental Cup against Pyramids. Even in their history, there was a time where they were Invincibles in the league and still didn’t win it.
So winning the Champions League last year, it was the first time where Al Ahli, kind of, since their league win with Omar Al-Somah back in 2016, that they kind of got that bottlers title away from them. You know, Al Ahli really are, in a way, the Arsenal of Saudi so to be able to win it twice in a row, which is something that hasn’t been done since Al Ittihad in 2005, is going to be a big achievement.
But, I’ve been watching Machida, and I watched how Vissel played against Al Ahli, and before they score a goal, they just look like they’re never going to score. And if you look at their game against Al Hilal the 0-0 in the league, you just never thought they could score. But once they do, and especially on home turf, once they get the fans on their side, (Ivan) Toney and Galeno just go into a completely different mindset.
And it’s always this pattern of Galeno starts, Toney adds and Mahrez finishes, and he almost did it but he was offside. So the thing with Machida is, that 5-2-3, formation, when Yengi is definitely going to be bothering whichever defensive midfielder. I don’t think going on Franck Kessie is the right option, if Ziyad Al Johani plays, he’s the guy to really press, because that’s the weak link of Al Ahli in the buildup.
So that kind of 5-2-3 and narrowing it down and preventing Atangana, preventing Kessie from getting the ball out, even Millot, who has been amazing at times, but when you really block him out, it’s hard to get through. That will be the key for Machida.
And in addition to tactics and strategy, it’s just the mindset of Al Ahli being too excited. I mean, that game against Pyramids, it was like a no-brainer, like Al Ahli, we’re gonna win.
So that’s why fans are scared right now. They’re more aware. Let’s calm down for a second. It seems easy; 90 minutes at our home turf. We’ve been one of the best teams in the region. Once again, we’re challenging for the league. We’re doing all of these things. Our players are playing better than ever before. We’ve had Matthias Jaissle with us for over two and a half years now.
But football is a fickle game, and so this idea that it’s going to be easy, it’s not and I actually think Machida have a better chance than Kawasaki did last year.
Defensive first approach the best way for Machida – Michael Church
I think Machida will take great comfort from the fact that they haven’t conceded in either of their two previous games in this competition. They’ve won both games 1-0. It’s a case of, to plagiarise the old Arsenal fan chant – it’s one-nil to the Machida.
They’ve grinded out results in both of those matches, and I think that’s where Go Kuroda, the coach, said after their semi-final win, ‘we play to keep clean sheets’. And that’s ultimately where their strength lies, and that’s where any hope that they have of winning this title will come from; trying to keep that very potent attack that Al Ahli has, to try to keep them out, because I think if they concede one, they will lose, because I don’t see Machida scoring anything more than one themselves.
They’re very direct – set plays, long throw-ins, there’s a sort of perfunctory sense about them. If you take the two semi-finals as a gauge of where the two teams are, I think, for a start, Kobe are a better team than Machida. I don’t think there’s any debate on that. And Kobe, I thought, played really well in that first half, certainly the first 35-40 minutes against Al Ahli.
Al Ahli really did come into the game a lot more those dying moments of the first half, and then the second half, I thought, to be honest, I thought Al Ahli hammered them. They went more direct. There was a lot more long ball football, and interestingly Jaissle was asked in the press conference about what he changed, and he talked at some length about the quality of the pitch, and that has been something of an issue at the King Abdullah Sports City where it’s not a great pitch.
And so because of that, he has accepted or acknowledged that there is a need to basically cut the pitch out of the equation. You play longer balls, you play a more direct game, and I think when you look at Al Ahli and both Jaissle and Skibbe, the head coach of Vissel Kobe, both commented on this, that Al Ahli won that game because they’re the most powerful team, they can play that direct style if they want.
They don’t have to play it, they have the players to not play a direct style of football. But if they choose to play it, they’ve got pace and they’ve got strength up front. Whether it’s Galeno, and if you give Galeno five yards of space he’s going to put the ball in the top corner. He’s shown that consistently in this competition. You’ve got players of Toney’s ability. You’ve got players of Riyad Mahrez quality. I think they’re going to make it very, very difficult for Machida.
I think Kosei Tani is a decent goalkeeper. You’ve got Gen Shoji at centre half for Machida, who obviously is a experienced and has played at a decent level throughout his career, but I just don’t think they’ve got the resilience to be able to keep not just Al Ahli and the players that they have at bay, but then, you look at the environment; it’s going to be a full house, the Al Ahli fans, once they get going, my God, the noise they create is quite incredible. And once they get behind the team, and once that momentum builds and builds and builds, I just don’t see Machida keeping them out.
Machida not a true representation of Japanese football – Scott McIntyre
I’m really big on nations having a national identity and how they play, and it’s a thing that permeates through club teams and filters its way up to the national team.
I’ve seen a lot of youth football and a lot of kids playing on streets all over the world, and I think Japanese kids from the age of four or five, until maybe 12, 13, 14, I think they have some of the best technique anywhere in the world. And for me, that’s the foundation and the bedrock of what the J. League’s been built on from 30 years ago, where there was a big Brazilian influence, and kids were reared to think of being good on the ball, being creative, wanting to take players on, wanting to challenge players, wanting to express yourself.
And we’ve seen, consistently, Japan produce these kinds of players, they haven’t really produced number nines; a problem that we see all around Asia with foreign players coming to the league, but they produced a lot of technically unbelievable central midfielders, really creative wingers, great overlapping full backs.
And the foundation of it all has been teams that have been built on wanting to possess the ball, wanting to be the team that sets the tempo and dictates the style of play. So to have such an extreme team, such as Machida coming in, it’s the kind of team that, not just now, but almost historically through the J. League as well, we haven’t seen Japan have this kind of team because it’s the antithesis of how of how kids are taught to play the game, of how fans are taught to view the game, of how coaches are taught to coach the game. And that goes right the way back to when they’re coaching four or five year olds.
So to then have this team going and representing Japanese football, to people who don’t see Japanese football regularly, maybe just in the Champions League, and you see teams like a Kobe, like a Kawasaki, like the Kashima teams of the past, some of the great Nagoya teams from previous generations as well, like all teams that that have wanted to express themselves and play football.
And now we’ve got this situation with Machida, where we’ve got just a vastly different thing. So for me, it’s a little bit, I don’t know if disappointing is the right word, but it’s not the representation… for me, they’re not a Japanese club. There’s something completely different that sprung from a different thing.
The club is a very different kind of character. I mean, they’re from Tokyo, maybe nobody realises that they’re actually from Tokyo, but they’re kind of from a satellite commuter corner of the world’s biggest city.
So they’re unfashionable from where they’re based, they’re unfashionable in how they’re coached, they’re unfashionable in how they play and they’re not an ideal representative of Japanese football.
