83ers 3 - 2 Grilled Birds
Ate By Three
Elias Sinks Birds
Grilled were booted out of the Cup at Division Four leaders 83ers's Tropico stadium, where English forward Danny Elias rolled back the years to get his team to the sixth round for the first time in their history, continuing a proud sequence of never being eliminated at an earlier stage than in any previous season.
Whatever might be given as the cause of defeat, underestimation cannot be applied here, as
Niculae Stanca took charge personally and drafted even
Abdul bin Jantan and
Seytek Djekshenkulov in as attacking centrebacks, having identified the 83ers' midfield as worthy of such an initiative.
Paolo Iten and Seytek Shaahee started together, with the Swiss in the middle.
This ploy worked as far as possession was concerned, with the Birds swarming the hosts' recognized Czech general Jaromír Albl. Sadly, it was a different matter in terms of outcomes, as neither bin Jantan nor Djekshenkulov were natural defenders. Their awkwardness at staying back was shown up soon enough, as both were found expecting the other to hold the fort as Grilled assembled an attack. German winger Andreas Hühnerhaufen seized the opportunity, making right for the heart of Grilled's half on a counter in the eleventh minute, and managed to hit it past Stacey.
Grilled were shaken but rose to the challenge, repairing that oversight through
Paolo Iten, who is showing himself perfectly capable of scoring not only from set-pieces. There was nothing particularly promising sighted when he received the ball some way outside the area, but he then constructed an equaliser out of that with some help from the distraction posed by Grilled's active strikers.
That didn't cure Grilled's actual deficiencies, though, and Elias was served on a platter when nobody thought to follow him in the 18th minute. It was again the motivated Hühnerhaufen who played a huge role, as he delivered an inch-perfect cross despite being tracked and forced to the outside by a diligent Shaahee. bin Jantan came nowhere near to cutting it out, and Elias had his pick of both corners, and picked the right one.
The Birds were still very much in it, but
Tian Yonghang may have to reevaluate his finishing after a great opportunity went begging minutes later. It should have been another immediate response after he lost the 35 year-old Simone Confalonieri coming in from the right, but was too wary of confronting Theodore Ng, and finally had his shot muffled by weight of bodies.
Elias had no such issue about overthinking after Grilled had successfully defended his earlier indirect free-kick routine, with Djekshenkulov notably AWOL as the 83ers advanced on the left. As the two-on-one situation developed, Zoran Böck wisely laid it off to his strike partner, and Elias lofted it over Stacey without hesitation to make it 3-1.
This was worrisome for the Birds, but Stanca stuck to his guns and refused to substitute any specialist defenders in, even as
Lin Jungui looked positively restless on the bench. There was some justification as he needed as much firepower as possible to make up the two-goal deficit, and his reasoning was supported by Tian's pulling one back just three minutes after the restart, with
Mayur Gudivada sparkling down the right.
It however proved a false dawn as Grilled were thereafter unable to force extra-time with 83ers defending for their lives, with the youngsters especially not able to adapt to the frantic pace that the home side forced. Albl was particularly fired-up as he became a one-man midfield wrecking crew, with one of his victims
Pompeo Bellamoli, who was caught late on the knee. Albl was suitably contrite after the incident and booking, but it will be Bellamoli who will be sitting football out for a week or two.
Djekshenkulov was soon carded also for what appeared to be thinly-veiled retaliation on Albl, but it would be the Czech who would have the last laugh as his side went through to the next round.
