Dutch Dizz
Fawzy In Fashion
Grilled Birds were knocked out of the AFC ASIAN CUP at the first asking by Omani II.4 club Flying Dutch'O'man, winners of the Oman Ruby Challenger Cup four seasons ago. A slight possessional edge by the Birds wasn't enough to overcome Dutch'O'man's competent back three, and given how useless Grilled were at the back themselves, the Omanis would go through by four clear goals.
Interestingly, Flying Dutch'O'man had won Group G despite having exactly the same number of points as the other three teams, as they all achieved one win and a draw; Dutch'O'man thus prevailed on goal difference, having put three past Sulla Felix - two by Enzo Ölscher - in their first game, before being unable to score thereafter. As the Birds would soon learn, this was a gross misrepresentation of Flying Dutch'O'man's potential... or perhaps it simply reflected more on their own failings.
Polish gaffer Tomasz Sirek was not short of star power, that said, having homegrown national team regulars Fawzy Naseem Al-Fehdy and Abdulfatah Fadhil Al-Mahry in midfield, with Khalfan Saad Al-Mushefry narrowly missing out on being selected for Oman's Asia and Oceania Cup squad. Three-time Golden Boot winner Jordi Consten would be their main attacking hope, having returned to Oman after a four-year break in Scotland with Diddyting Diddies, with 39 year-old Swiss Enzo Ölscher captaining the team beside him.
Grilled might thus have had the advantage in youth, but as composure and ultimate output went, they turned out to be no match for Sirek's finely-tuned machine. Flying Dutch'O'man exhibited a mastery of the art of allowing opponents to have the ball without being able to do anything productive with it, and many were the occasions where the Birds pinged it busily about for half a minute or so, before either turning it over or having to pass it all the way back to their defenders. This came to a head with Polish custodian Juliusz Dudziak cutting out
Lim An Keng's 20th minute cross with ease, before throwing it out for Fawzy Naseem Al-Fehdy to feed Enzo Ölscher after a blood-pumping thirty-yard dash.
Fawzy would then make it 2-0 from his team's first corner a couple of minutes on, with
Chia Kwang Tse somehow blocking his own goalkeeper from reaching Sultan Abdulsalam Al-Dhamry's delivery, allowing the midfielder to hammer it home. This about summed up the tone for today's game, and despite Lim reacting quickest to tap
Darko Andrović's intelligent setup home in the 36th minute, this only brought replies by Enzo Ölscher and Khalfan Saad Al-Mushefry by the 41st, with Grilled's defending reminding one of schoolboy games at times.
If the Birds were to turn this around, they would have to fall back on their offensive prowess, and
Brian Reddy kept the flame from going out with a fabulous stunner from twenty yards straight afterwards, with the Omanis disorganized for once after
Aw Keng Chuan's initial effort had come some distance off Pushkal Singh - who definitely felt the impact in his stomach. Dudziak would then bail his team out with a needed stop from
Hwang Teck Fu, and Flying Dutch'O'man's increasing vulnerability was underlined by their conceding a penalty seven minutes into the next half, duly converted by
Raúl Himadas. 4-3 it was, then!
The Grilled fans would be singing about a comeback after this, but they would be sorely mistaken, as Flying Dutch'O'man finally got serious about their own attacking contribution. They hadn't had to actively push forward, given the lead that the Birds' hopeless defending had gifted them, but proved to be quite gifted at it actually. Abdulfatah Fadhil Al-Mahry would reply within seconds, and by the 59th minute, the lead had been stretched to four goals with Pushkal Singh and Fawzy Naseem Al-Fehdy taking advantage of some poor decision making, largely by
Ha Qicai.
Gandhik Chitre would try to answer, but with Dudziak standing firm, it was clear that the odds were stacked heavily against Grilled.
Hein Thiha Pyae Ko's entry for
Chia Kwang Tse in the 70th minute would shake things up in midfield a little, but it was far from enough to craft another Birds goal, let alone salvage the match.
