Dim Lights Out
Igo Excellent
Grilled's first-ever visit to Syria ended painfully, as Division Two side Soho Dim'Sah handed the reserves a sound hiding. Local hero Maher Igo did his popularity no harm at all with a first-half hat-trick, while putting in a solid outing at centreback to deny Hjortlind more than a sniff.
Having a defender as a direct free-kick taker is rare in the footballing world, but Igo showed just why he was able to land that plum responsibility as he arrowed one almost flat over Grilled's wall and under the bar. This came after the Grilled defence had held out for 22 minutes, and was expectedly deflating. Dim'Sah striker Uns Fadi was overeager going into a tackle, which brought a caution and an earful from Tuan-Mu, but Igo soon erased that memory with a surging run and confident finish.
Hjortlind looked to be on course to end the reserves' miserable streak of whitewashes when he ran furiously through as Grilled pushed on straight from the kick-off, but was headed off by Alaga before being dispossessed by Igo. Hjortlind tumbled to the grass, and was horrified when the referee wasted no time in booking him for a dive. To rub salt into the wound, Igo repeated his demonstration of how it should be done, by getting his third goal in the 34th minute.
Alaga followed that up by making it four goals for the Dim'Sah defence as he took over Igo's attacking duties, before winger Samer Hemidi got on the inside of Huihong to slice a breathtaking effort past Bao-Tam.
The understanding of the mostly-homegrown side was obviously superior to Grilled's, and even the two non-locals - Portugeuse Daniel Carmo and Finnish Jere Erkko - combined fluently. There was little that the visitors could have done to stop Mohamad Hamouche's second-half brace, and Igo would have gotten a fourth had his composure held up.
