Crows Eaten
Beau Of A Hit
Welsh II.1 strivers Crow Castle would face Grilled Birds in their red and yellow halves for today's World Battle game led by club legend and former national youth winger Lee Blayney, but were found wanting against the Birds' free-flowing footy. They would attempt to rely on an overpowered right flank with Blayney's 24 year-old successor Leo Watts backing him up, but the Birds' superior possession would tell.
This match came alongside second-hand reports that
Gústav Thoroddsen was considering a move after discussions with the higher-ups, which would surely have caused a riot last year. Thoroddsen's more-indifferent form lately would make any departure easier to bear, although as he evinced in the 14th minute, he retained a scoring quality that will be difficult to duplicate. Most forwards would have allowed Meilir Llywarch to get away with his fractional miscontrol, but not Thoroddsen, who pounced on it even before the defender had fully realized it was happening.
Brazilian Number One Domenico Tracchi could do nothing as the Icelander tucked it away in his far post by the book, but his judgment against
Lim An Keng's arcing lob eight minutes later would be inch-perfect, as he forced it onto the crossbar at the final moment. The Crows would have to rely on pace to break Grilled's lines, as happened in the 26th through Romanian speedster Ionuţ Preda. Blayney had pulled
Federico Parada wide to open up the whole right wing for Preda, and French striker Yanis Beaugendre found satisfying first-time contact to send the ball spinning past
Dimitris Germanakos to level up.
There was no lack of to-and-froing going on, and the tendency for Blayney and Watts to advance would leave opportunities for Parada in turn. The Bolivian found himself entirely unattended about the 31st minute, and
Aw Keng Chuan's timely clearance allowed him to punish that disrespect with a short sprint and strike. Two minutes on, Danish playmaker Sejer Le let it rip from over 25 yards with Germanakos still trying to regain his post, and the goalie had
Ha Qicai to thank for guarding his line.
The restart had the Crows try to catch Grilled unprepared with some high-energy rushes, the pick of which was probably Arcadi Guixer's tricky dribble from the left that had
Brian Reddy going the wrong way. The long cross was not met well by Lee Blayney, however, and it was
Mohd Marzuki Khairul's turn to explode upfield, and lay it off to
Gandhik Chitre for 3-1. There would be some controversy in the aftermath with
Chia Kwang Tse accused of provoking the opposing fans, which got him a yellow card.
Grilled Birds would regain the hop in their collective steps in the last half-hour, with
Federico Parada their main man as the Crows overrelied on their right wing. His own efforts would come to naught, but they did push the Crows teams back on the defensive, and it was instead Chia who would pick up the fourth goal from a sneaky free-kick disguised as a direct strike. The midfielder was wise enough to tone his celebrations down this time, fortunately!
