"Cassio was outstanding for both halves and Diego was very, very comfortable on the ball and did a lot of work. Cassio for me was man of the match," he told SEN radio's The Four Diegos show.

"He put a number of balls into the box and obviously we didn't get onto many of them but it was great to see."

Aloisi, a favourite son of the club, described Kashima's performance as "awesome" but added they played into Adelaide's hands by crossing the balls in all night "and [Ange]Costanzo and [Sasa] Ognenovski just cleared the balls out.

"It was a great night for Adelaide United and Australian football. It's another bit of history for the club. It just goes to show how good we are."

However, Aloisi was scathing of the home fans who he described as "dull".

"It was a strange crowd. There wasn't a lot of atmosphere. You heard the Kashima Antlers fans a lot more, a helluva lot more. That's strange. Tonight was kinda dull. I don't understand why.

"It was still a massive crowd."