High Fives Not Enough
Grilled Birds won their final two matches in the Trophy of Legends, to finish 248th of 8376 participants, with a 6-1-1 record. While this was insufficient to make the knockout stages, it remained their best finish since their qualification in 28th place two seasons ago, and an improvement over the 867th they achieved in their last entry.
Both games were won with five goals, with English fifth division club Keynsham Town first to taste the wrong end of a 5-4 result. Their lively Russian wide attacker Dmitriy Byvshev had a field day tormenting
Gilbert Webb from the left, which resulted in two sharp goals for himself;
Islom Davlatov would match Byvshev brace for brace, seeing as he wouldn't help out much in pressing, and Dorian Sava's pinpoint header in injury time sparked some small panic, but couldn't turn the match around.
Next up were Swiss VI.368 champions Blackburn United, who will be going up to Division Five. Their playstyle was almost as flaming hot as their some-would-say-garish jerseys, but the Birds hit even higher temperatures as they built up a 4-0 lead by half-time. Iranian sweeper Siavash Amir Teymouri couldn't handle
Kalki Parvathaneni, who sent two acrobatic strikes beyond Czech keeper Hugo Wágner. Finnish Number Six Miikka Raami was perhaps the pick of the second half with two fine breakthroughs, but that only made it 3-5 at the finish.
Farmer Bunnies missed the playoffs by a hair with an identical 6-1-1 record, as they finished five places off the top 64, of 3270 teams in the Heroes of 2014 Trophy. The nil-all draw they had against Uruguay II.4 runners-up Los Pereira's did neither side any favours in this respect, as Los Pereira's eventually ended 70th too anyway.
Nurlan Ablaev and
Vishnu Tallapaka did test Luis Miguel Jaramillo, but not nearly enough.
The Buns would exit triumphantly, edging German fourth division leaguewinners Village Bombers United 2-1, with
Richard Agyei swinging in from the right wing to cap a lighting-fast 18th minute counter. Andy Heinrich would equalize for the Villagers six minutes on, due to a bad defensive lapse, but second-half substitute
Christophe Fouche settled the matter with a confident half-volley in the 57th minute.
Mushtag Al-Nameeri was a little unhappy at not making the knockout rounds, but agreed that it had been a long campaign. "Further, we have the qualifiers this Sunday, and the Supporter Week Trophy, and then the Pacific Cup to tune-up for next season. That's a lot to do."
Grilled International didn't exactly meet the high standards of their more-illustrious forebears, as they finished 2412th of 8186 clubs, with a barely above-average 4-1-3 record. They won their seventh match, against Cuban III.1 side WindHunter, with
Wang Hanxuan leading the way from left wing, with a brace by the 21st minute. WindHunter fought back to 2-3 as Abraham Palencia answered
Fausto Perono's poach, but International ran the score up to six goals in the second half.
International would then be smashed by French Division Six representatives US Clermontoise, despite taking the lead in the 20th minute through
Ragib Banović's opportunistic strike. Homegrown striker Sébastien Clément put his team back ahead by the 35th, and US Clermontoise then rode their momentum to a 5-1 final result.
