Norge 0 - 6 Grilled Birds
Vikings Raided
By Royal Will
The second round of the My Road to the World Cup trial ended exactly as the first had, with Grilled Birds hitting six past the Norge XI without reply. Pitch conditions remained poor as it had been for Cabo Verde, but the Birds carried on regardless.
Hwang Teck Fu would be the only one to score on both days, as he stunned the opposition with a brace right before half-time - before being taken off.
Dan Alstani tried out a 4-5-1 after the previous 3-4-3 had not exactly stretched the team tactically, which left Hwang as Grilled's lone target man at kick-off.
Houssam Belhocine and
Lim An Keng were the ones to fill the usually-missing fullback roles, and would try out the overlapping runs that were otherwise less seen with the usual Birds setup.
Norge were captained by Bjørn Salte in a 2-5-3, if with partner Agnar Amundsen soon emerging as Hwang's preference to run against. Morten Wærstad made for a big landmark at left forward, and it was his standing his ground against
Hisham Zubari in the ninth minute, that led to Norge's first and biggest chance. Anders Ødegård appeared through on the knockdown, but he took an extra touch against
Radomil Marcol, and had the ball nicked from beneath him.
Appeals for a penalty went nowhere, and Grilled Birds found themselves most productive attacking through
Wu Ping De on the left, with Jakob Svarva often pushing upfield recklessly. This brought the opener in the 22nd minute after Wu sent a homer past Bjørn Buran at his near post, and his cross to
Mohd Marzuki Khairul after 34 minutes deserved to be the second. Marzuki overthought his finish, sadly, allowing Salte to throw him off his shot.
Norge had the most success with direct runs, such as Egil Teigen's sprint in the 37th, but he was perhaps too generous in laying it wide for Sven-Harald Amundsen despite having a clear sight of goal. Ødegård was then back with an effort that went marginally over the top left corner, after he had given
Genki Nagano the run-around following a neat trap of the ball with his outside foot.
This was looking like a survivable result for Norge to take into the break, at least until
Hwang Teck Fu blasted a second goal home with three minutes left.
Houssam Belhocine then did his reputation for poor timing on his tackles no good with a horrible step-in on Morten Wærstad, but the free-kick wound up being cleared deep, and had
Hwang Teck Fu hold Amundsen off to score again.
Even that did not sway
Dan Alstani from his planned tactical substitutions, though, and the second half began with
Chad Thach in for Hwang, and
Chia Kwang Tse for the somewhat pedestrian Marzuki. Chia's relative hunger was quickly on show as he won Grilled a free-kick in the 52nd minute, allowing
Houssam Belhocine to showcase the better side of his game with a dipping take past Buran for the fourth goal.
There would then be some poor luck for the Birds' next two chances, with
Chad Thach arcing a header over the goalie but off the crossbar in the 68th minute, before a second free-kick by Belhocine shave the top of the woodwork. A foul and booking for Stein Hammer then led directly to
Ananda Hettiarachchi's strike in the 84th minute, after which the Sri Lankan prince then chipped Buran magnificently in added time.
