What do Besiktas, Anderlecht, Genk and STVV in common? They all kept Club at 1-1. Ronny Deila had trouble coming to terms with this realisation.
“Our first half was not up to par. We were poorly organised, and I'm to blame for that. We manned the pitch in a 3-5-2, but it didn't pan out. STVV created some danger, but so did we, and it was quite an open game, but still we didn't play at our usual level. In the second half things went a lot better. We created chances and were in full control. Their equaliser came out of nowhere, however, and really cut us off. A fourth 1-1 in a row, but we have to keep in mind what was positive. And we need to be a lot more efficient inside the box. We deserved to win, but I'm mostly disappointed with our first half performance.”
When asked just why he lined up in a different set-up, Deila was clear. “I opted for a 3-5-2 because of those playing today, and also because of the opponent. Sint-Truiden is a tough team to tackle, with lots of position switches. To boot, we gave them too much space. After the break, we went back to our regular 4-3-3 and that went a lot better, even if we should have done more with the chances we had. We are just not clinical enough. There's not a lot of time to train on specific situations, with all the games following up in quick succession. We now have to make sure we keep working with a positive feeling. There's no use in pulling each other down, as I'm convinced we can turn this around.” (SF)