Rules Kept
Three In A Row
While Grilled's two-all draw with Arcturules might have kept them in good shape to advance to the finals of the four-club SCC (Individual) tournament, coach
Niculae Stanca was certainly not a happy bunny after watching the team slack off after going into the lead for the third consecutive match.
Arcturules, in their change strip of black with red accents, lined up with the same 5-3-2 that had allowed them to counterattack their way to a 1-0 win over UEFA on Sunday. Grilled likewise saw no reason to deviate from their best formation, with
Qassem Madaini participating in a bid to recover his mojo.
The kickoff had the Birds taking the game to their opponents, who did create moments of their own, chiefly through agile wingback Fu Lai Yeng. The former Footwork FC youngster's stays in Romania and Croatia has imparted him some new moves, judging from the way he teased weekend hero
Chow Ying Lee by dribbling out of defence several times.
Fu probably pulled the tail of the tiger one time too many in the 20th minute, as he lost the ball to
Alex Fonseca, stationed out wide for once. The Portuguese placed the ball back into the middle, where it was duly scooped up by
Tian Yonghang, poked beyond the last man and then Gaël Guérin in the Arcturules goal.
Grilled were growing into the game, and
Lin Jungui appears to have found a knack for scoring, as he shattered Arcturules' expectations of a centreback by taking the ball into the penalty area himself before unleashing a belter past Guérin. The local defender has been on a roll, having scored more in the first half of this season than in his three previous seasons combined.
Some of Grilled's players clearly thought they were home and dry, not unreasonable given how little the opponents were seeing the ball, and were nearly reminded of how dangerous this thinking could be when former U-20 playmaker Du Zhenting rocked the crossbar from deep. Du was determined to make a difference, but his fall inside the box after some great penetration was laughably unnatural, so much so that referee Etor Saez could not help but smile as he booked the protesting youngster.
That and the half-time whistle diffused the tension that had been building, and Arcturules returned with their rising spirits apparently mellowed by the interval. However, it was their turn to improve over time, and their hustling unnerved the Grilled midfield some, especially after Sebastião Jesus was booked for a painful-looking hard man's tackle on Djekshenkulov.
They did get the penalty that they had been waiting for in the 73rd minute, with
lu Zunwen's sneaky tug on Chau Wai Yew's jersey not quite as well-hidden as he thought. Given, it was probably the only way that Lu would stop the slippery youth international, but there was no saving the end product, with Argentine Carlos Quinteros waiting for Stacey to commit before placing the ball the other way.
Stacey, who must have smelt the signs of another comeback, gave
Yvan Lefébure a ton of instructions before putting on for
Alex Fonseca, but on hindsight he should perhaps have taken the panting
lu Zunwen off instead. Lu had been struggling since the restart, and he passed up what should have been a certain goal after being slow to a rebound with the goalie badly out of position.
Chow Ying Lee put in perhaps his only poor attempt at goal of the week when he elected to lob and looped it well over the bar, and Arcturules would punish all the slack finishing as Chau breezed past a clearly unfit
Qassem Madaini to tie things up seven minutes before the end. Madaini was taken off soon after, but far too late to save the result.
