Boogie Booting
Crackling Chinebuah
Grilled's second stringers were put to the sword by Ghanaian Division Two champions BoogieSS FC, who romped to eight goals against
Hang Bao-Tam. It was an object lesson for Grilled's trainee wingers, who were very ineffectual on the whole. Their only saving grace was a well-taken assist by 19 year-old
Feng Darong, who at least prevented Grilled from suffering a shutout.
With the relegation decider taking a lot out of Grilled's first XI, none of them were selected for the friendly with the exception of Branbilla - even Penati, whose interplay with Han Kok kept Grilled from going down, was rested.
Tapesh Chowdhury looked set to star when he burnt his man on the left several times in the first few minutes, but it was unfortunately no more than a flash in the pan as he faded thereafter.
Wingback Shabazz Addai extracted his revenge with a trick or two of his own as he shuffled the ball past
Weng Seng-Huat all too easily, and Bao-Tam couldn't get down low quickly enough to keep his grounder out. 19 year-old local forward George Chinebuah was in his element, and scored a brace without breaking into a sweat, as large cracks appeared in the Grilled defence.
Grilled never appeared to be in the game, even as veteran Swede striker
Ulf Hjortlind banged in an interesting low cross from the hard-running
Feng Darong late in the first half. Hjortlind followed that up with a typically hot-headed scything tackle into a Boogie defender, proving that age had not quite mellowed him, and was fortunate to earn just a yellow card.
Boogie missed a great opportunity to restore their lead as they played their free-kick routine to near perfection, only to see it fall apart at the last step as winger Joseph Mensah skipped unopposed into the six-yard box, but was late with his attempted header. No matter, as he made up for it with a breathtaking run in the 57th minute to make it 4-1.
The Birds could not quite get back into the game as the players failed to click, meaning that Skinderholm's blatant dive was quite unnecessary, not to mention unsightly. Branbilla, who was the only Grilled player to display appreciably merit, unavoidably tired after an hour of ball-chasing, leaving Boogie's three goalscorers to duplicate their feat to give the scoreline a decidedly symmetrical look.
