Cows Culled
Sid Saves The Day
Though Sid's general play has been disheartening to say the least in recent weeks, the Polish defender will always have a place in the starting eleven as long as he continues doing his job from dead balls. A calm penalty angled into the top right corner today proved the difference between the Birds and Division Three challengers mad2cow, as Grilled crept into the quarterfinals of the Singapore Cup.
Despite suffering three successive defeats in their league, mad2cow have been a completely transformed team in cup games. Thus it was that beefy Swedish No. 5 Ulrik Landell powered his way past the attentions of
Han Lik-Tsun in the tenth minute to give the home side a dream start after they appeared to be more interested in holding out.
The opening exchanges were rather even, and though
Lee Jie Siong was unfortunate to see his sweet strike punched out by Italian goalie Fausto Pirozzi, mad2cow's Chinese winger Liu Boon Mee should really have given the hosts a commanding lead when he inexplicably poked Alexis Rivas's brilliant cushioned header onto the post from two metres out. Rotteveel then had a golden opportunity to mark his return with a bang, but the Dutch forward didn't manage to get any power behind his shot.
Jie Siong recovered Pirozzi's hurried clearance and fed it straight back to Subri, though, and the Malaysian ex-youth international displayed great composure to run the ball halfway past the goalkeeper before passing it into the net. He might have had a second too in the 55th minute after Rotteveel found him with a backwards pass, but his cultured chip didn't drop enough, instead bouncing harmlessly off the top of the crossbar into touch.
Grilled's failure to make their chances count threatened to come back to haunt them as the hosts constructed a few dangerous counterattacks, but then a stroke of luck fell their way. To be fair to current Israeli U-20 midfielder Evyatar Yehezkel, he knew very little about the position of the ball when he went up into the air with MacKinnon in the box, but his right arm was clearly raised and MacKinnon's botched header even more clearly came back off that.
The referee paused for a second but could do little but blow for the penalty kick, to loud booing from the disgruntled home fans. Sid, who had been unimpressive so far, faced Pirozzi down and fired it neatly high and to the right of the keeper, who moved only slightly. MacKinnon might have gotten one of his own with a stumbling but effective dribble past the centerbacks, but skewed his finish marginally wide.
