Nurki Nipped
Monori Out
The Birds went a way towards recovering from Sunday's horror show with a 4-2 win over KS Nurki to progress to the semifinals of Turniej im.Witolda Pileckiego. The third division Nurki had the better of the first half, but were left high and dry after Hungarian forward Dávid Monori was sent off just before half-time.
KS Nurki had been unbeaten in Group C, concluding their fixture list with a fairly credible draw against a strong Orły Radzia side, and with Konstantinos Mpitsikeas in a rich vein of form, a close match was on the cards. There wasn't much scope for innovation owning to the weather, however, and Moroni probably didn't have to step in front of
Gene Filippone's free-kick in the 23rd, which led to a soft - and crucial - yellow card.
One-nil came from Grilled's only scorer against United, with
Woon Shun An less affected than most by the rain; slowly inching his way towards the Nurki goal with each short pass, the central midfielder remained in a promising position when an opposition counter was stopped and succeeded by a big clearance, which he took down expertly before launching it past Józef Kuliś in the Nurki goal.
Santur Anasagasti was next to be booked for obstructing
Mohd Safri bin Mohd Kassim, who showed signs of getting back to his best. It would be Nurki who were the more promising overall, though, and they were next to score, from a naughty indirect free-kick that had the Grilled defence rushing to the wrong side.
Moroni then drew a foul from
Ling Fuquan that saw the Grilled defender third in the referee's book, and after
Tian Yonghang made a hash of a trick, Nurki broke in numbers down the right, and went ahead through Frank Reece. It was all going against the Birds at this juncture, as the Polish fans burst out in confident chants.
Not for long, as Moroni then whirled about and kicked the ball away after disagreeing with the linesman's call, which could well have been wrong. Only after that did he appear to remember that he had already been booked, but before he had time to plead, the stern-faced Sun Youfa was pointing for him to get off the pitch.
Grilled weren't going to wait for Nurki to plan their next moves, and a massed strike down the middle saw Mohd Safri bang in a shot onto the bar. Anasagasti was first to the rebound, but was thrown off by the unexpectedly low bounce, and the quick-thinking
Zhao Jing Wei slid in strongly to put it in.
As the second half wore on, it became evident that Nurki were not able to adjust to losing their point man - Frank Reece tried his best to fill in, but the American's pace was greatly discounted by the wet ground. Grilled had them on the rack, and after 69 minutes,
Ling Fuquan sent his team into the lead with a devil-may-care charge down the left.
Mohd Safri then made the result safe with a measured touch, as Reece blew what was perhaps Nurki's best chance at saving the game, after Chinese left winger Du Zuhua made a heroic drive on the flank. On another day, Reece might have gotten to the optimistic cross in time, but he fell a head short on this day.
It was enough for the Birds to wait out the final minutes, and
Chow Ying Lee almost looked relieved to be taken off for
Leong Wan Kang, given how terrible a time he had in the poor conditions.
