Crash At The Death
Six Minutes Of Hell
The Birds were mere minutes away from claiming a useful point at the Avengers Apocalypse, when Arrogancae found three very late goals to consign all of Grilled's previous hard work to the bin. Although the home team had shaken up their side short days ago, with Simeon Rupieper, Florian Platschka and Clemens Waterman leaving, it was the old hands who gave them the win.
Arrogancae's clearout had been followed by the arrival of highly-rated S$13 million twenty year-old Italian goalkeeper Massimo Cazzulati, though judgment on his abilities will have to be placed on hold, as Grilled mustered precious few shots on his goal. Local wingback Chen Haojie was also signed home from Germany on a S$5 million deal, and did well on the right side.
Grilled had their own debutants, as
Marc Pujolràs and
Walter Ross appeared for the first time; they would promptly discover that they had not joined a possession-oriented team, however, as Grilled immediately set up a soak-and-strike strategy.
The hosts were eager to get off on the right footing, and a misunderstanding between Behr and Ross resulted in an open look by Radivoje Milašević in the seventh minute, with Valdir out of position. Fortunately, he missed, and after Valdir wiped Vuokila out barely legally in claiming the ball a few minutes later, Grilled weathered the constant stream of attacks somewhat more comfortably.
The seventy-odd thousand home fans were not too pleased with Grilled's defensiveness, but the Birds could not have cared less, as they made no bones about their intention to return with a point -
Gleb Dorogan tried to shave seconds off the clock even in the first half, a move which brought a yellow card, and derisive whistling from the stands.
It was all going swimmingly as far as Grilled's coaching staff were concerned, and they put the fresh legs of
Yvan Lefébure on in the sixtieth minute, as well as ordering the fullbacks to tuck into the middle.
They might have gotten away with the negative football as well, with Pan Dawei flubbing perhaps the best chance of the game after Dorogan had miscleared and left the former Singaporean national player with time to spare just five metres out. When that hit the outside of the post, Grilled's travelling fans must have felt that it was their day.
Unfortunately, it was not to be so. Bögengang, who had done a good job of tying up the Arrogancae defenders all game long, conceded a booking after clattering Heikki Vuokila in the eightieth minute. Play stopped as the Finnish midfielder received treatment, and Vuokila immediately got his payback as he lumped in the resulting free-kick, after it was curled into the box by MacKay.
That was a cruel blow for the Birds, who had no idea how to proceed, after the Plan A that had served them well for so long failed. A half-baked and forced-looking attempt at finding the equaliser backfired badly, as the Arrogancae backline cut out an obvious pass by Mohd Safri, and Darmantas Niurnaitis picked Grilled off on the break.
There was no hope of a comeback now, and Pan Dawei scored a giveaway third, after
Roberto Mausisa flung himself at, and completely missed, an attempted interception. Vuokila, who had so often been the bane of Grilled, was then taken off to a hero's reception.
