Requiem By A Dream
Vázquez Victorious
El Salvador Division Two side Ultimate Dream took Grilled to extra time, and there snapped the Birds' run of five friendly wins in a row with a headed golden goal. The 106 minutes saw plenty of Grilled attacks to please the home support, but they will be concerned at an inability to convert that appears to have carried over from the weekend.
Shiya Shaahee appeared to be enjoying a surge in popularity, as he was extremely well-received during his entrance, but it was current Cape Verde national goalkeeper Eduardo Ribeiro Vieira that really got the cameras flashing. While he has apparently fallen out of favour recently, with Buracona's Gávio Melo Santos starting the last few internationals, Vieira's experience cannot be questioned.
The 27 year-old was given a baptism of fire, though, as Grilled paid him scant respect with a barrage of shots. This was not wholly unwarranted, as
Djan Bacelar rocked the crossbar in the second minute, and
Ling Fuquan's early cross from the left in the sixth was sufficient for
Chow Ying Lee to score.
The Birds carried on in the same vein, but were missing that extra man in their secondary 3-5-2 formation.
Qassem Madaini, rested on Sunday, had an easy time of it in central defence, but
Walter Ross and
Hilal Bakhtiar left much to be desired with their attempts at overlapping.
Leong Wan Kang was unamused when Bakhtiar held back in the 21st minute and allowed what should have been a sure thing be picked off by Dream's Danish captain Christian Strunge, and he was not about to let Strunge get away just like that. Unfortunately, all he got ahold of was Strunge's jersey, and referee Ambrosio Zuñiga was not about to let that go.
The card mellowed Leong somewhat, which was not ideal with him being Grilled's only out-and-out forward on the day. Bacelar eventually began to abandon his deeper position, but even that wasn't enough to make an impression on Vieira, who looked quite invincible once he warmed up to the pace.
This gave heart to the Dream players, who had been diligently chasing and screening for most of the match. They showed that they were serious when Gabriel Alamilla got stuck in against
Mohd Safri bin Mohd Kassim in midfield, concluding with a dangerous raking kick that earned him the game's second caution.
Mohd Safri was by then signalling to reserve coach Luis Alcántara to release him from his midfield role, but the Argentine refused, and more chances went a-begging with
Liang Liyong not a natural winger, and Shaahee rigourously man-marked by the duo of Valerio Castillejo and Fernando Vega.
The same could not be said for the visitors, as Castillejo found himself clear after a clueless Birds assault got repelled. With just nine minutes left, Dream could not afford to miss, and they didn't - sweeper Moisés Espinoza responded to the call and was the first to the delayed angled cross.
Grilled could have cancelled that when Vieira made his only mistake of the day by dropping Leong's spinner from the left, but nobody had gone up, and the goalie gratefully gathered it on the next bounce. It transpired that this was partly due to Douglas Antunez bumping Mohd Safri aside in an off-the-ball offence, though, which earned him a yellow.
With extra time now a near certainty, Alcántara shook things up by giving the nearly-forgotten
Yvan Lefébure a run-out for Bacelar, with
Gleb Dorogan entering at the same time for Leong. The two had last appeared together in a 0-4 away defeat to heimu XI, and alas, history would repeat itself.
It could have been otherwise had
Tian Yonghang not skewed an otherwise excellent strike wide, which left Aarón Vázquez to power a corner kick by Castillejo past a flailing
Dan Seng five minutes later.
