Not So Athletic
Fjällbratt Shines
Grilled expended rather more than they might have wanted in their customary first-round Cup thrashing of part-timers, with three of their squad getting yellow cards, which count in the league, and an injury to franchise player
Quah Han Kok which was fortunately less serious than it seemed.
Quah was no angel either as he got stuck in with one of his famous "get both the ball and the man" tackles in the eleventh minute, with the recepient Huang Nam-Anh less than happy about it. Grilled were by then already in the lead, as Rotteveel scurried past a few desperate blocks on the left to open his new accounts.
Fjällbratt was next, then Paullin, as two Athletic players got carded as they found it difficult to time their challenges properly against players far quicker than they were used to. Fjällbratt got Grilled's first brace as he rose to head in a cross from Sid in the 32nd minute, then bizzarely got booked for a questionable goal celebration in which he booted the ball level into the crowd, some of whom didn't appreciate that.
That didn't dampen Fjällbratt's day, however, and the Swede supplied several sweet crosses of which two were converted. Rotteveel took one of them on the volley, while
Mohd Firdaus bin Yaacob was more conservative with the other one, and took his time trapping the ball and placing his shot.
A moment of panic then ensued when
Quah Han Kok was kicked squarely on the shin by a defender's swirling clearance. The incident left the ex-U20 international rolling in pain, as his clueless assailant Kui Sang-Thong, a security guard in real life, stood gaping as he possibly contemplated the effect his swing might have on the S-League. Thankfully it was rapidly ascertained that nothing was broken, though MacKinnon still had to be called upon to replace Quah.
Grilled's players weren't too affected by the substitution, and continued merrily with their dismantling of the badly-outclassed Athletic side. Rotteveel completed his hat-trick, and then Grilled's two Swiss midfielders got goals number eight and nine.
The day would be most memorable for
Peter Fjällbratt, however, as the 20 year-old went from having scored just one senior goal to getting a hat-trick under his belt. Having a 39 year-old leftback pull up with cramps to let one through is probably not the most glorious way to go about it, but one could sense it didn't matter to the delighted Fjällbratt.
Rotteveel then matched Fjällbratt's tally of a hat-trick and a yellow by earning his own caution for jumping into the opposition keeper's goal-kick, an action which must have bemused all present as Grilled were already in double digits. This did however lead indirectly to an eleventh goal as the retaken free-kick was poorly taken and ended up with Jie Siong, who shrugged and slotted it beyond Yang Byung-Uk to pad his own statistics.
