Hienghène Sport and Hekari United ready to fight for their lives in the Champions League

Current OFC Champions League winners Hienghène Sport will have a tough clash against Hekari United today. Both teams lost in the opening round of the Group A and now they need to fight for their lives if they really want to go through the next stage.

Hienghène had an unexpected major blow in the first matchday when they were thrashed by Galaxy FC from Vanuatu while Hekari United played a decent match against Eastern Suburbs but they could not hold Martin Bueno that scored twice to give the win to the New Zealanders.

Hekari will have some advantage as they are going to count on the crowd support once they are playing in Papua New Guinea. The biggest problem for the Reds is the absence of David Muta that was sent off in the opening round. The 32-year-old midfielder is one of the most important players of the team and he is a legend there – he was part of Hekari’s squad that won the OFC Champions League in 2010.

With Muta out of combat, Brazilian Vinicius Kryzozun and Michael Foster will have the mission to lead Hekari’s midfielder while the Kepo brothers are going to be in charge of finding the net for the Papua New Guinean side.

Hienghène Sport faced lots of troubles in the 4-1 loss against Galaxy. They left too much space between their lines in the defense and Brazilian midfielder Roberson enjoyed it to show off his class. The New Caledonian side must fix it otherwise they will see another Brazilian punishing their defense.

The Papua New Guinean side faced some defensive problems in the opening round because Eastern Suburbs knew how to exploit Hekari’s defense perfectly and it might be a problem once again if they do not pay attention on their opponent’s attack as they have some great forwards like Bertrand Kaï that won the Golden Ball award in the 2019 OFC Champions League and Antoine Roine the two most important goals of Hienghène’s history: The winning goal at Champions League final against AS Magenta and the goal against Al-Sadd from Qatar in the 2019 FIFA Club World Cup.

It is also a great opportunity for these two players to show their quality one more time as both forwards did not perform well in the opening.

Both teams are strong and it is going to be a very tough match. The midfielders are going to play a crucial role in this game. Keeping the ball possession must be the X-Factor to decide the winners and the losers. This match can be the end of the line with one match in advance for the losing team if Galaxy draws against Eastern Suburbs.