Jaška Clears Test
Tough Nut To Crack
It took 120 minutes against Argentine H.A.L VI.48 side Testigos del Maestro, but the Birds would finally come away with the win, in a friendly where the some 3,100 spectators got their money's worth.
Radovan Jaška spent just three minutes before establishing himself as
persona non grata for injuring a Testigos midfielder, but he would stay the course, and eventually come through with the crucial penalty conversion.
The Birds were not risking many of their own starters, with the exception of
Teo Chuan Yong leading the line;
Cameron Law moreover squeezed out
Manuel Vadalà to start in goal, with Italian second choice
Manuel Vadalà suffering a particularly poor patch of form in training. They were up against a Testigos team whose focal point was 20 year-old homegrown target man Giuseppe Tamone, as they lined up in a cautious 4-5-1.
Central midfielder Edgardo Maximiliano Llorente wouldn't last long for all that, as he surged forward only to be cut down from the side by Jaška, who escaped a sending-off only because he was not yet the last man. Still, nasty swelling on Llorente's right knee meant that his participation was over, with Isidro Bravo taking over. That understandably didn't endear Jaška to the home fans at all, and he would need to dodge a retaliatory tackle from Tamone two minutes on, for which another card was doled out. Polish referee Olgierd Chudyk would step in there to keep the tit-for-tat from getting out of hand, and succeeded.
In between, the home team had to survive an inventive effort by
Gandhik Chitre, who struck a curious one with his knee on the turn; young goalie Marek Damek blocked it then, but he was probably alright as long as he didn't move out of the way. Testigos would then run a little short on midfielders, as Carlos Ramón Babington was the next to limp off, after a wholly unintentional bump to his groin from a teammate. Backup defender Juan Pablo Defferrari would have to fill in, which didn't do much for their attacking potential.
The remainder of the half was largely a static standoff, what with the home side clogging it up well, and Grilled not having the skill to bypass the bodies in the way.
Egemen Dinçer Ferzan was the rare, occassional bright spot in the Birds' offence, and his best contribution was skipping past Santiago Luis Casais on the inside in the 25th minute, before drawing it back and across the box to
Hwang Teck Fu. Hwang tried to curl it into the corner with his right boot, and wasn't all that far away.
That meant it stayed scoreless, however, and it would take
Chia Kwang Tse coming on for the second half, to get things moving. This however also applied to Testigos, who had apparently decided to take some risks, after basically clamming up for the first half. The fiery Tamone would get several passes nicely under control to begin with, but would not advance far with
Aw Keng Chuan mindful of the threat he could cause.
A dispossession and prompt distribution to Ferzan in the 51st minute would open the Testigos defence up for Chia to have a go, but he would disappoint after some great approach work to lose the defenders. This did presage perhaps the busiest period of the day, as both teams exhibited a positivity that had been absent before. Antonio Fritzler worried Law for a moment with a creative chip that floated barely wide in the 58th, while
Toma Tamiya came close to reprising his recent hat-trick deadliness ten minutes later - but for Damek's cat-like reflexes scooping it away at the last instant.
With it still goalless at the 70th minute,
Lim An Keng would enter for the barely-moving Teo, who passed the captaincy over to an eager
Radovan Jaška - which brought renewed booing from the stands. Testigos would make their own final sub soon after, as Tamone left to the exact opposite reaction. The forward had run his heart out to little reward, and Greek Number Nine Lenos Kefalaris was undeniably an upgrade, if still not enough.
Atang Mangoye replaced
Toma Tamiya as the match entered an extra thirty minutes, as some players clearly struggled to retain an interest in the friendly.
Gandhik Chitre was not one of those, as he continued his regular forays from midfield, some of them even fairly effective. Chia would pick him up after getting boxed out early on in extra time, but Damek was there again with an excellent one-handed stop on the dive.
The Testigos goalkeeper would finally be beaten in the 106th minute, and it took a penalty kick to do it. It had been a laudable comprehensive defensive performance from the hosts, but one shot lifted into Martín Ignacio Muñiz's hand was all it took, to have it all in vain. Muñiz's teammates argued - reasonably - that there was no way he could have withdrawn his arm in time, but Chudyk stuck to his decision; Jaška sent it home to more relish than usual, as the stadium erupted in indignant jeers.