Know No Better
Lesson For The Ages
Grilled Birds would try their hands at The Golden Trophy again, but a lopsided 0-8 humiliation against English Premier club Mikeys World of Pessimism served only to remind them of how far they were from the best. Veteran midfielder Gary Dempster was the only Mikeys star with a brace as they boasted of seven different scorers, a testament to the breadth of their powers.
In their fourth straight season at the top of the English league system, Mikeys might still be awaiting their first national-level honours, but this is not for want of planning by local coach Tony Bird. Some fans have become a little tetchy over the lack of big-name signings since the S$25.5 million capture of Tanzanian national goalie David Lekamoi, but it was not as if he would be bothered much today. The age of their core men such as forwards Curt Stelle and Poonsak Sangsom, playmaker Archie Knock and defender Ivan Kýr might be a valid concern, with them all 33 years or above, but from how they took the Birds apart today, that will be a concern very much for the future.
It didn't help that Grilled's own talisman -
Chan Ze Han - was not fully recovered from a recurring calf concern, or that
Tian Yonghang had given
Paulino Trindade the go-ahead in the centre, with
Mohd Marzuki Khairul shifted wide left. Facing English Premier opposition was probably not the best of times to experiment, and Tian would be punished for his presumption shortly, as Knock rapped on the door with a clever dash past
Damian Hutter in the fourth minute, as former English international William Amberwood plugged it across from the left.
Dimitris Germanakos got a bit to Knock's delicate touch, but not nearly enough.
The Birds barely knew what hit them for the rest of the half - nay, the match - as Mikeys came at them from all directions, save for a flash of genius by Chan in the 17th minute, which saw him predict Kýr's backpass but fail to catch up. Amberwood would twist
Aw Keng Chuan like a pretzel with his pure speed and control to set up an open shot in the 23rd, followed two minutes later by Dempster profiting from some confused defending from Grilled. Kýr then blasted one home from twenty yards three minutes from half-time, a failing that had to lie mostly on Germanakos's head.
The rueful expression on
Chan Ze Han's face as he came off for the break indicated clearly that the gig was up for Grilled here, and Tian indeed evinced no indication that he had any idea of how to turn this around. The interval did allow Grilled to settle some, with
Orest Tokarz on for
Gandhik Chitre on the hour to add some physical heft; however, from how the Birds were not even near holding their own in midfield, this had to be a lost cause.
Mikeys would step it up soon, and Sangsom made it five as ex-Venezuelan national midfielder Anderson Cedeño weighed his options in the 66th minute, before spotting the Swede's move.
Chia Kwang Tse seemed to have anticipated that to an extent, but couldn't get in the way in time, pretty much the story of the day for Grilled. There would be another brief lull, before a cruel double blow as the 80th minute rolled by, as Dempster and Jonah Carter ravaged Grilled's tired right flank.
Tian would take
Joe Reece off for
Ibnou Balde here, with the Welshman not unhappy to have his day ended early for once. Carter might have had another as Mikeys restarted with a free-kick floated straight down the middle of the Grilled penalty box, but his cheeky backward flick would go horribly off-target. There would still be minutes enough for storied Armenian fullback Yesayi Baklayan to pile an eight on, though, as they poured forward in injury time.
