Tigers Take Nine
Face Of Symmetry
Guyana IV.26 club Western Tigers FC HG proved entirely unready for the Birds' visit late Wednesday, and were taken apart 9-0 by a relatively-unpolished Grilled XI. To be fair, the affiliates of Germany's 11 Freunde Havelland and Zambia's Nchanga Rangers FC had not been around for very long, with this being but the tenth match since their founding. 18 year-old striker Avi Ghorpade demonstrated stellar promise in the few touches he had, but he would soon be pressed - ineffectually at that - into backline service.
Paulino Trindade would be raring to advertise himself on the right wing, having found himself further back in the wide man pecking order than he liked, and
Tian Yonghang will have to give him additional minutes, from what he displayed. A seventh minute raid saw Trindade open confidently with a flowing dribble that took him inside Emmanuel Ward, which was followed by a 19th minute assist for
Evandro La Face, whose header looped teasingly over young Barbados goalie Lionel Ross. Ross was more fortunate as Grilled overworked their free-kick in the 23rd, when
Gandhik Chitre should really have gone for it.
That proved but a momentary stumble, however, and
Joe Reece would catch the inexperienced Ross standing where he shouldn't have been, with a fierce volley across the box two minutes on. It was
Evandro La Face's day to be served, it seemed, as all he had to do was to bend his neck to put
Radovan Jaška's perfect corner delivery into the net, 31 minutes in.
Mohd Marzuki Khairul and Reece then made the most of some Tigers hesitancy in their own penalty area, for six goals by half-time.
This was also it for
Egemen Dinçer Ferzan, who was substituted by
Federico Parada in the inverse of their league swap - which also saw plenty of lazing about by the Birds, who didn't seem too eager to make their hosts look too bad.
Teo Chuan Yong would provide a little kick up the hiney when he took over from
Mohsen El Khateeb in the 70th, however, and after
Joe Reece went over in the box two minutes later,
Radovan Jaška was called upon to dispense with the penalty, which he did with his usual aplomb.
Reece was then booked for getting handsy with a defender in trying to win the ball for another easy shot, which pleased the Tigers fans to no end, given how many of them evidently felt that he had gone looking for the previous penalty. Still, it was true that the Tigers defenders were fairly error-prone, as when Adam Reed left
Gandhik Chitre all alone, to invite the obvious pass from
Evandro La Face the next minute. Chitre couldn't quite believe it either, it seemed, and he made a hash of the finish.
The game would end as it had begun, with Trindade and La Face having the final says; Trindade shuffled an eighth past Ross in the 81st minute as Grilled carved through from the middle, and then there was a short stoppage for Sahasrad Pandit to get his dodgy left knee looked at, which had Benjamin Hanger enter as his replacement.
Evandro La Face then finished on the second try after Ross somehow blocked his first, before being carded too as he unleashed full force on Kamlesh Banerjee from behind.
