Blu Eagles Down
Thor's Fury
Gústav Thoroddsen made up for his unseemly league dismissal the only way he knew how to, by hitting a hat-trick against Switzerland's Blu Eagle in this tournament fixture. The Division Five Eagles had put together a respectable record with victories over AVK Football Club and TSV Ottobrunn Fussball towards qualifying for the next round, but a Birds side firing on all cylinders would make a mockery of those ambitions.
As over the weekend, the Birds exploded off the blocks again, to diminish their opponents' greatest strengths. Captain Nick Menges and Giorgio Fiby made for a strike duo that had grown together into a partnership that could threaten the best of defences on their day, but they would see nothing of the ball, as Grilled imposed themselves at the other end. After a dizzying opening three minutes,
Joe Reece and
Orest Tokarz had both breached Aaron Winter's net, and the Dutch goalkeeper looked almost apolopetic as he sought an explanation from his defenders.
It didn't get any better either, as
Joe Reece added a second in the eighteenth minute with
Lim An Keng threading it through for him over thirty yards, with Alfio Tibi just unable to cut out the pass as it curved elegantly away from him at the last instant. This was perhaps less than what the Eagles deserved, with their engine room otherwise more or less holding their own against Grilled. However, in football, it is the individual moments that count, and in that the Birds had them well beat today.
The match then proceeded relatively quiet through half-time with the Eagles never quite finding the right balance between their preferred conservative waiting game and pouncing, and the second half got underway with the Birds still pulling the strings. While the gap in possession was minimal, Grilled certainly did more with the ball when they had it, and a creative combination 58 minutes in freed up
Chad Thach for an unconventional backheeled attempt, that nearly caught Winter by surprise.
This was followed by Hungarian fullback Peter Falk attempting to twist the tenor of the contest by himself, with a gliding run into the penalty area that ended in him flinging himself forward and over, on slight contact with
Ha Qicai. This was too contrived for the referee to swallow, though, and resulted in a yellow card with no hesitation.
Gústav Thoroddsen was also raising his game on the other end, and he made the most of the space that Falk had left behind, to attack the empty right side and score for 4-0.
The Eagles would pick themselves up, and Giorgio Fiby would get them the consolation goal that they somewhat deserved, as he read Renzo Weigt's forward pass flawlessly in waiting for
Dimitris Germanakos to come out, before sliding it past the goalie's trailing leg at just the right instant. However, this only encouraged Thoroddsen to complete his hat-trick via two nifty chips by the 73rd minute - the second instigating Luis Alberto Ramos to lash out in frustration - which had the Icelander smiling even as he was replaced by
Phua Ming Xin with five minutes remaining.
