Aalesund vs Vålerenga

Five goals each. Ten goals in total. Not a single clean sheet between two sides who have not kept one all season. If you needed any more evidence that something is badly wrong at the back for both of these clubs, Sunday's match at Aalesund was it.

The thing is, this was not a game short on quality in the final third. Both sides created chances, both sides had players who could finish. What neither side had was any desire whatsoever to do the basics at the other end. Defending is not glamorous. I know that. But it is the foundation of everything. You cannot build a results record on sand, and that is exactly what both of these managers are trying to do.

The First Half Was Absolute Chaos

Aalesund had the ball in the net inside three minutes from the penalty spot. A penalty that early sets the tone. You expect the home side to settle, to manage the game, to make it hard for the visitors. They did none of that.

Vålerenga responded by scoring on fourteen minutes. Then Aalesund got two more before the half-hour mark, goals on sixteen and twenty-nine minutes. At 3-1, the home side should have been shutting up shop. They had the lead. They had the crowd. Instead, Vålerenga pulled one back on thirty-three minutes and Aalesund added a fifth goal on thirty-five. Three goals in seven first-half minutes. Three goals.

Listen, that is not football. That is a training ground session with no goalkeeper. Four goals scored between the twenty-ninth and thirty-fifth minute tells you there was no defensive shape, no communication, no accountability from anyone wearing a shirt in either backline. Aalesund went in at half-time leading 4-2 and somehow that felt precarious. It was precarious.

Vålerenga's Second-Half Comeback

Both sides made changes at the break. Vålerenga sent on two players and Aalesund made one change of their own, taking off the player who had scored on thirty-five minutes. Aalesund then added a fifth goal on fifty-six minutes, their penalty taker from the third minute getting his second of the match. 5-2 with over thirty minutes to play.

You would think that was game over. You would be wrong.

Vålerenga scored on sixty-three minutes. Then again on seventy. Then again on eighty-five. Three goals in twenty-two second-half minutes to level at 5-5. The Aalesund backline completely collapsed. Completely. The saves column tells part of the story. Vålerenga's goalkeeper made five saves. Aalesund's made two. Two saves. In a match where the opposition had twenty-two shots.

The thing is, Vålerenga had 68 per cent possession and won 68 duels to Aalesund's 52. They were the stronger side on the ball for large parts of this match. But they were 5-2 down with half an hour to go. That is an attitude problem from both angles. Vålerenga showed desire to come back. Credit where it is due. But why were they 5-2 down in the first place after being the dominant side in possession?

The Numbers Are Damning for Aalesund

Aalesund sit fifteenth in the Eliteserien table. Two wins from sixteen games. A goal difference of minus fourteen before this match, and they have now conceded thirty-six goals in sixteen league games this season. Thirty-six. That is unacceptable at any level of professional football.

Their home form over the last five matches reads one win, three draws, one loss, with twelve goals conceded at home in that run. Zero clean sheets. Not one. A clean sheet percentage of zero across their last ten home matches. Zero. How does that happen? That does not happen by accident. That is a systemic failure in how this team is set up and coached defensively.

Aalesund had only 32 per cent possession in this match. They hit ten corners and fired twenty-four shots, nine of them off target. They were aggressive on the counter, and their attackers competed. But the moment Vålerenga got the ball and came forward in the second half, nobody stepped up to stop them. Seven counter-attacks for Aalesund, and they still let in five. It beggars belief.

Vålerenga Cannot Travel

This point about Vålerenga needs making too. They are tenth in the table and they came into this match with one win from their last five away games, conceding fourteen goals in those five away fixtures. One win, four losses on the road. Their away form is a problem that a 5-5 draw does nothing to fix. A point away from home when you were 5-2 down feels like a win in the moment. It is not a win. It is a point from a game you should have taken nothing from, against a team that cannot defend.

They had 123 attacks in this game. One hundred and twenty-three. They had 66 dangerous attacks. They hit the woodwork twice. And they still only drew. The standards required to win away from home simply are not there consistently.

What This Result Actually Means

Aalesund are in trouble. Two wins all season, a defence that has given up over two goals per game, and now this. A 5-5 draw at home against a side that was 5-2 down. That is a result that should embarrass the entire club. Not the fans. The players and the coaching staff.

Both managers need to look their defenders in the eye and ask one simple question. Where is your accountability? Forty-six shots combined in one match. Ten goals. Zero clean sheets across the entire season for Aalesund. You cannot fix that with clever substitutions at seventy-four minutes. You fix it by demanding standards in training every single day and dropping players who do not meet them.

It was an entertaining ninety minutes. I will give you that. But entertaining and unacceptable are not mutually exclusive. End of.