Melbourne City take on Kofu Fung Lam – Who’s better, McClaren or Uttaka

According to the latest news, Melbourne City of Australia host Kofu Kazuhashi of Japan in the first round of Group H of the 2023-24 Asian Champions League group stage….

The 2023-24 AFC Champions League will be the last edition of the competition before its reorganization and will be played from September 2023 to May 2024, with clubs from Asia’s 21 member associations set to embark on another assault on the summit of Asian soccer next week.

The 40 elite clubs, divided into 10 groups, will battle it out for the first time since 2020 with the resumption of home and away matches, which will see eight teams debuting in the AFC Champions League. For the first time in an AFC club competition, the Video Assistant Referee (VAR) system will be implemented from the group stage, a further expansion after it was introduced in 2022, when it was only used from the last 16.

Melbourne City were under immense pressure after being technically knocked out of last season’s AFL Grand Final by the ‘under dogs’ Central Coast Mariners. Despite gradually increasing their strength and prestige to a level beyond that of the old powerhouse Sydney FC in recent years, they have only won one AFL Premiership and one FA Cup to date, which is clearly not in line with the vision of Melbourne City when they were acquired by the City Football Group.

Melbourne City has made major improvements to its squad, with the departure of key players such as Tilyo, Bose, O’Neill and Glovers, and the introduction of players such as Sackey, Arslan, Yakolis and Ugakovic as additions, but the team’s biggest reliance is still on captain McClaren and left winger Matthew Leckie.

Melbourne City’s home field strength is quite strong, currently in the middle of 14 consecutive undefeated home games in all competitions. The pitfall for Melbourne City is the injury problems in the forward line, with both left and right wingers Leckie and Nabbout out due to injuries, McClaren’s burden has become heavier.

Melbourne City and Kofu have no record of meeting each other in history, and with strength and experience, you may want to look for Melbourne City to beat AFC Champions League newcomers Kofu Fahrenheit at the Rectangular Stadium.