Double Three-Twos
Hilal Bakhtiar had few comments after the match, save for a cryptic quip on needing to refresh the squad. "Oh, it wasn't bad." he said off-handedly. "But maybe we could do with some new faces, to keep it fresh."
Teo Chuan Yong's strongest impression was on how well the opponents gelled. "Many of them have been playing together since their academy days - something that we may be losing soon. I mean, I took the long route home, but the feel never totally leaves you."
Both the Bunnies and International had won their respective friendlies 3-2 before Grilled Birds kicked off against Heroj, and for the Buns it would be against former Ghana Consolation Cup winners GHEPARDOS AZUL, who had just finished runners-up in II.3.
Vitaliy Efendiev levelled early from Kodjo Addae from the spot, and
Jerad Meyer won it on the counter in the 69th minute; Anum Atuahene missed a penalty soon afterwards, to Ukrainian head coach Pavlo Bandura's undisguised annoyance.
International won theirs against Russian Division Four visitors SafRom, after the Moscow club came back from behind twice, and had seemingly grasped the momentum after Bohdan Bayan made it 2-2 from a vigorous 72nd minute counter.
Li Xin Chi had been excellent bombing forward from central midfield, though, and a deceptively-subtle run in the 81st minute saw him slide it beyond Vyacheslav Volosnov, to end the argument for good.
