In a thrilling second round match of the AFC Elite League, Shanghai Seaport lost 0-3 to South Korean powerhouse Pohang Ironmen on the night of October 1 in Beijing. After the match, Shanghai Seaport's manager Muscat calmly analyzed the loss in the press conference.
Facing the 0-3 scoreline, Muscat's expression was unperturbed. He firmly believes that Shanghai Seaport's loss was inevitable and should not make any excuses for the defeat. Compared to those coaches who look for reasons to shirk their responsibilities after losing a game, Muscat's mindset is much broader.
Muscat pointed out that Shanghai Seaport actually played quite well in the first half, creating many good chances to attack in front of the field and even missing some scoring chances. If they had capitalized on these chances in the first half, the result could have been drastically changed. As to why Shanghai Seaport lost the game, Muscat also told the reason.
Muscat believed that the main reason for Shanghai Seaport's loss was that Pohang Ironman showed a much better performance in the second half, which made Shanghai Seaport have to accept the defeat. However, Muscat's words revealed a high level of intelligence. On the surface, he praised Pohang Ironmen's second half performance, but in fact, he implied that Shanghai Seaport's second half performance was poor. It was the poor performance in the second half that led to Shanghai Seaport's final loss.
As to why Shanghai Seaport had a very different performance in the first half and the second half, Muscat did not analyze the reason in depth. But insiders are clear that this has a close relationship with Muscat's tactical layout.
This season, Muscat has been vigorously promoting a full-strength passionate attacking tactic in Shanghai Seaport, eager to compete with the opponents with the intention of quickly suppressing them. However, it is well known that this tactic consumes a lot of physical strength of the players. If the first half can end quickly, Shanghai Seaport will have a chance to win, but if the first half fails to break the stalemate, Shanghai Seaport will face a huge challenge in the second half, which is physically draining. Given the limited strength of the Chinese Super League teams as a whole, it would be difficult for most of them to compete with Shanghai Seaport. As a result, Muscat's tactics have suffered many setbacks in the Chinese Super League, as evidenced by the fiasco against Pohang Steelers.
In this match, if Muscat can adjust his mindset, give up the aggressive attacking tactics and focus on defensive counterattack instead, there may be a very different result. Therefore, the 0-3 loss in this match will hopefully wake up Muscat and make him more scientific and flexible in his future tactical layout and deployment.
