Charles Three
Possession Wins It
The Birds settled into their accustomed start-of-season spot at the bottom of the table, becoming the only team in II.2 not to have recorded a win in the opening two games after being outdone 2-3 by CharlesCheesePie at home. They did however retain the excuse of not having two local lynchpins in
Mohd Safri bin Mohd Kassim and
Zhu Changchun, who are still nursing a ligament tear and a battered knee respectively.
There wasn't much for it for new coach
Niculae Stanca but to persist with his less-favoured 3-5-2, with
Walter Ross being given a second league start in a month, after a season in the wilderness.
Lin Jungui made way, while
Seytek Djekshenkulov moved into the middle filling in for Zhu, his left-wing position in turn taken up by
Alex Fonseca.
CharlesCheesePie fielded an unchanged team from that which lost 1-3 to Arrogancae, but they were indisputably happier today, with Grilled's defence being nothing like that of the Cup champions. Grilled were banking on controlling the play, but found the visitors' international midfielders too good, and after 13 minutes former U-20 player Soon Yew Yeng wriggled past his national colleague
Chow Ying Lee and clobbered a stiff effort past Stacey.
Grilled were hardly dominated, though, and had their moments too, with Chow in particularly fine form despite the rainy weather. The midfield worked hard, and a change of possession in the 21st minute resulted in a mad dash up the middle, with the two-man CharlesCheesePie defence parting for Player of the Season
Abdul bin Jantan to slot home only his second league goal.
CharlesCheesePie were on balance getting the more chances, however, and after yet another good spell right after thirty minutes, jumped on a questionable attempt at cutting out a pass by Ross. The Austrian defender missed the clearing header by a hair, playing Mexican Manfredo Noriega in, who unselfishly put the ball in the middle for Quirze Sans to bag against Grilled for the first time in three seasons.
Stanca, aware that Grilled were being barely outfought, withdrew
Slavcho Tzonkov for
Yvan Lefébure as a defensive midfielder for the second half. This however played right into the hands of the opponents, who simply moved slightly deeper and upped their aggression, with Wong Chang De carded for a biting challenge. They then extended their lead further through centreback Mario Gneo, who got plenty of force behind his header on a corner, his fourth in as many games.
The home fans were unimpressed as Grilled headed towards yet another defeat, though the backline did put Ng Wee Kiong off his shot from an indirect free-kick.
Chow Ying Lee then gave the Birds renewed hope, as he single-handedly broke the offside trap to chip a reducer past Diaconescu to set up a frantic finale.
CharlesCheesePie would not be drawn in, unfortunately, and their experienced Romanian coach János Daday put one over his countryman by eating up the minutes with a trio of substitutions. Stanca belatedly put the 35 year-old water-carrier
Rosendo Chinchay on in a last effort to save a point, but as substitutions go, that was probably not the most inspiring one possible.
