Al Hilal, the break and individual errors: Vicenzo distances himself from Al Ittihad's Asian defeat | Goal.com

Published on 13 Oct 2026 | Reading time: 2 minutes

Germany's Jens Wissing, the head coach of Al-Ittihad, has distanced himself from responsibility for the defeat to Shabab Al-Ahli in the AFC Champions League Elite, pointing to several other reasons behind that loss.

Shabab Al-Ahli left Jeddah with a 2-1 win on Tuesday evening at the Al-Inma Stadium, in the second round of the league phase of the Asian competition.

Speaking at the post-match press conference, in comments carried by the Saudi newspaper "Asharq Al-Awsat", Wissing said: "I am sad because of the defeat. We wanted to win to make up for the loss in the league."

That's two defeats in a row for Al-Ittihad. They went down 3-1 at Al-Hilal last Saturday in the eighth round of the Saudi Roshn League.

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Saudi Pro League

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Arabian Gulf League

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On the reason for the defeat, he explained: "We conceded two goals because of easy mistakes, which made the task difficult afterwards. My job as a coach is to work with the players. We were better in the second half and we reached the opponent's goal, but we were not successful."

He added: "We played with three forwards because we had more crosses, and it was possible to make use of one of the crosses. We did not play the game well. We had many chances and we could have been better."

The German then turned to the numbers: "The bad start alone is the reason. I saw the statistics, we had complete possession of the ball by a large percentage, and that is proof of control. We tried to change the game and we did not succeed."

He continued: "Let us not forget that we had a difficult match two days ago, along with the difficulty of the circumstances. That affected us, but it is not an excuse."

Asked about his selection, he added: "After a defeat, the opinion that talks about changing the players is easy. We had done that before and won, but after a loss the talk becomes easy. When I take a decision, it is based on analysis."

He continued: "The first long break may have an impact. We wanted to come back strongly but that did not happen. There are players who sat for a long period without playing, and that has an effect, but we worked well in this period and we were not successful in terms of results."

His closing words: "Before the break we made some mistakes, but we were fortunate in getting good results, and that is what is different from what is happening now. My job, whether we win or lose, is to analyse everything and then work on correcting it."

Two games, no wins in Asia. Al-Ittihad drew 1-1 with Qatar's Al-Shamal in the first round of the league phase before this setback.

One point is all they have to show for it, leaving them twelfth in the West region standings.

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