Not About To Flop
Bilal Sacrifice
It will be a second Challenger Cup finals in three seasons for Grilled Birds, as they eased past Toa Payoh's Ang Mohs in flip flops after a dicey first half. The immediate price was however
Bilal Mohammad Harun being out for a month, after he aggravated a muscle tear in his right thigh. That aside, it was markedly one-sided for a semifinals, as the Ang Mohs failed to live up to their victories over Joker 9 and Arrogancae in recent weeks.
Their 1-3 loss to Kampung Reunited on Sunday didn't bode too well for their form, granted, but they did have enough big names available to present some challenge on paper at least. They had in the 23 year-old Amani Mokhtar one of Singapore's best young classic centre-forwards, a competent midfield anchored by Frenchman Hugo Henni, and the imposing Vito Stefančič captaining the side from the back. The parts simply weren't coming together, though, and the recent departures of veterans Danilo Bruschera, Donyo Penchev and Sepp Möhle could not have done much for Ang Mohs' team cohesiveness.
Moey Xin Seng would again sit this one out for the Birds, as he entrusted the club's fate to the next generation; this would leave
Abd Hadi Taib Mazhud and
Chu Xin Lee to flank
Vikram Mudaliar in the attack, with
Chan Ze Han dropping back to midfield.
Shekar Kannan would return on the right, with
Bilal Mohammad Harun and
Teo Chuan Yong starting together in a bid for control... which would end very badly for the former.
The Ang Mohs' newfound reputation would be found slightly wanting from the get-go, as the Birds assumed overall possession without undue difficulty. There would be plenty of movement as Grilled probed for weaknesses, and Mudaliar would have his jersey tugged too obviously by Eduardo Carlos Angel, as he made to bring a long ball under control in the sixth minute. The angle wasn't completely ideal, but
Bhavya Panigrahi went for it from the free-kick anyway, and buried it into the defensive wall.
That didn't set Grilled back for long, as they soon went 2-0 up. With the Ang Mos clogging up the centre, Grilled would see most of the room to work with on the flanks, and it would be the ever-reliable
Kalki Parvathaneni to cook up an assist and a goal in good order. He would shuffle it inside for Mudaliar to attend to in the 14th minute, and the Grilled Number Nine would throw his marker off with a little hop over the ball, before whacking it home. Kalki then went for it himself in the 25th minute after reading the situation, and left Portuguese goalie Nani Rosário little more chance.
Just when it was starting to look hopeless for the Ang Mohs, they found a counterattacking reducer out of the blue.
Chu Xin Lee appeared to have lobbed Rosário for the third, but it came back off the bar, and an unprepared Birds side had left much of their own territory unmanned. Laurin Étienne Zrost had all the space he needed to dribble into, and once he put the final cross beyond Panigrahi, Mokhtar was left with a standard headed finish.
It only got better for the challengers after the match had to be stopped for Bilal to be looked at - and eventually come off; Referee Girkantas Lapis got it back going from a drop ball, and Grilled clearly hadn't learned their lesson, as they allowed Ang Mohs to run them ragged again, with Stefančič doing the honours this time round. They would at least respond immediately via an elegant
Chu Xin Lee strike, and Bakhtiar made it a point to warn his team to take the lead into half-time.
That was about it for the Ang Mohs' defiance, as it turned out. Grilled Birds were a transformed team in the second half after switching Kalki out for
Heng Dong Chu, as
Salah Kamel got to grips with Bilal's responsibilities. Indeed, Kamel could be attributed with the Birds' relative defensive comfort in the second half, although his shooting left something to be desired. Kannan pulled it back to Bilal's favoured spot in the 48th minute, from which Kamel bent it grotesquely wide.
A single goal remained a tenuous lead for the Birds to hold, and Ang Mohs could hold out hope for another counterattacking breakthrough, as long as it stayed that way - which it would not for much longer. There wasn't much space for
Teo Chuan Yong as he contemplated a ball lofted into his general area, but he shocked all with a brilliant bicycle kick take - and none more than Rosário, who remained unmoved as it bounced past for 4-2.
Salah Kamel added another in the 73rd minute as Grilled kept the pressure up, and the three-goal advantage was enough for Bakhtiar to withdraw Abd Hadi for
José Luiz Velho.
That hardly slowed Grilled's advance as Velho proved little less effective than his more illustrious predecessor, even as Chu added a second for himself off a low
Heng Dong Chu cross, two minutes after that substitution. Velho would embed himself deeply into play, and got on the scoreboard in the 80th, before nearly supplying Mudaliar with an assist. His exploits then took a darker turn as he put Mark Schüler out with a raking tackle on the left calf, and it was a wonder that he managed to stay on, not that it would have affected the outcome much.
