yup, had the same thing too. 1st half dominated by me & 2nd half dominated by the other guy who's absent.
my guess is that i play with high press so player get tired on 2nd half. the thing i did is change to low press, play defend/attack (starts with normal) and somehow manage to switch that guy comeback to my comeback near death.
my hypothesis is that nodeus change the engine by purposely let the game change by half. so if it happens to you, you just switch up a lil bit.
pretty weird 1st half tactic done perfectly didnt workout any on the 2nd half