Bakhtiar Under Fire
Four seasons of unprecedented success has spoilt the Grilled Birds fanbase, or so it seems, with scattered cries of "
fraud!" ringing out amongst the main gallery, as the club's latest loss sunk in. Bakhtiar would not address this directly in his post-match interview, where he opted to instead emphasize the competitiveness of the S-League, and
Shekar Kannan's debut.
"It has been a poor start, yes, but we are just six points off the top." he consoled. "A decent run can sort that out in a hurry. I thought we were extremely unlucky once again with several likely goals going over, and of course that penalty save. Kannan did fine to me, but I guess his old mates know him as well as he does them."
The S-League would have an unexpected leader today, as Villains F.C. rose to the top on eleven points with their 1-0 away upset of favourites Haha. Giovanni Trombetta broke Haha's iron defence with ten minutes to go in this meeting of the league's only remaining undefeated sides, which has the Woodlands giants staring down Singapore's footballing pyramid.
"I wasn't making up excuses when I said that most of the clubs in the S-League can conceivably win it." Bakhtiar continued. "I mean, I would still fancy us over anyone all considered, but the fact remains."
Sarcastic Fringeheads were back in the mix in second place with their 4-0 punishment of Crypto Moon, who must seem destined for the drop now - all the more as -= Manchester United =- opened up a five-point gap between themselves and the basement, with a much-needed 2-1 home result against Robbie Football Club. Viktor Saunov and Mirko Pogliaghi scored against Jan Paradysz, to give United their first league triumph of the season.
Farmer Bunnies at least continued to rip through III.9, as they recorded their fifth win on the trot, although Team Boba did not make it particularly easy. Boba would adapt well to the early exit of Tunisian winger Farid Tarchouna to an ankle injury, and indeed created the most chances in the first half. The Buns would fare better after the break, and a bad miss by
Wong Ting Yew would be followed by
Vishnu Tallapaka finding the winner from open play.
Sunil Patel could not get enough of his 38 year-old captain. "He's a legend, can I say more?"
Kungfu 11 kept up the pressure with a 2-1 win over Leeds Celts that was harder than it should have been, while headache overtook The Sing Tigers in third place, on Sorin Biriescu's magnificent chipped winner in the 57th minute. Bukit Gombak defeated Rivervale Titans 4-2 to complete the week's home sweep, as the hapless visitors finished the day with nine men after Ng Yew Fu and Kwang Lai Eng were red carded towards the end.
Grilled International - and IV.54 as a whole - drew in the Battle for Division IV, with International held 2-2 by the Florida-based United States Eagles FC.
Chua Jun Long seemed to have won it after Andrés Hoyo had equalized on the counter from
Zaini bin Hj Kaling's 15th minute effort, but former Slavia Anit's wariors player Steven Khan rounded
Querubim Santos Couto in injury time.
Wang Hanxuan for one seemed to take that quite personally.
Molto Bassa Parmense emerged 1-0 winners over Spain's Hot Sweat in a mostly-balanced contest, but The Sun men would fall to Faroese representatives ViKing RG, playing at a considerable disadvantage as Nadh Didi managed to get himself booked twice in the first eight minutes. Jiří Kochánek did well to reduce in the 66th minute following great work by Abdul Shauqee down the left, but they went no further than 1-2.
