Weight Of Expectations
Kalki Never Too Old
The Birds kicked off the new league season with a home stumble against HEBFC Tonners FC, who overcame a stiff possessional disadvantage to prevail through Gay An Soon's last-minute winner. If the 23 year-old Gay is cementing his status as one to watch for the oncoming decade, however, a 38 year-old
Kalki Parvathaneni refused to ride into the sunset to make space yet, as he equalled the Tonners man's brace.
Last season's encounter here had Grilled win 4-0 on a barrage of second-half goals, and there would be next to no changes here, save
Chan Ze Han starting in place of
Moey Xin Seng, with
Teo Chuan Yong benched due to a late fitness concern.
Egemen Dinçer Ferzan would again feature on the right, where he regrettably matched unfavourably with Slovakian powerhouse Michal Balkovič. The visitors' sole purchase in the past season had been German goalkeeper Eliot Frankenfeld, who would not make the starting eleven.
There would soon be some end-to-end action to raise the temperature at The Cooking Pot, which saw an attendance of over fifty thousand as the fans continued to show their support. Kalki would engage in some chicanery with
Enrique Baena down the left, but alas the final strike was forced to be taken early by Jesse Zabel. The Tonners saw much better luck as Migliozzi restarted with a huge goal kick to Balkovič, and Gay Ah Soon's control allowed him to glide past
Bhavya Panigrahi, before a fierce grounder that came off
Dimitris Germanakos's fingertips.
Grilled had no real answer to the Tonners' attacking bursts despite claiming most of the ball, and their worries were compounded when
Damian Hutter appeared to jar his right foot in the nineteenth minute, which fortunately turned out to be a false alarm. A frightfully open game saw
Aw Keng Chuan advance almost recklessly to equalize in the 30th, only for Tan Tse Kok to cancel that three minutes later, as Gabriel Mazo Calvo put a strong header through the Birds' lazy backline.
The Tonners then went 3-1 ahead, as they countered with great pace down the left once more, with Ferzan bouncing fruitlessly off Balkovič as he tried to slow the opposing winger. That started with Hutter's advance being stopped on the edge of their own box, and the penalty calls were ill-advised as Balkovič fed it to Yong Siong Eng amidst the distraction. The Birds would at least pull another back before half-time, as
Chan Ze Han followed up a
Bilal Mohammad Harun signature strike, and was rewarded when Migliozzi was unable to hold onto it.
2-3 for the hosts it was then, as half-time rolled around, and
Chia Kwang Tse took over from
Chad Thach as Grilled chased the game. Unfortunately, they continued to fumble the balance between defence and offence, with
Damian Hutter finding himself shooting over in the 59th. The ball boys were again arguably too efficient as they enabled the goal kick to be taken nigh-immediately, and it was Yong's turn to be of assistance as he found Tan Tse Kok with Panigrahi hopelessly overburdened.
Again two goals in the red, all
Tian Yonghang could do was to place his trust in his substitutes, and certainly it was hard to see how
Gandhik Chitre could do worse than Bilal, who had contributed little other than his first-half strike that led to Chan's reducer. Tonners head coach Li Woon Kok would make a surprise replacement too concurrent with Chitre's entrance, as he pulled Migliozzi for Eliot Frankenfeld, despite there being no signs of the Italian struggling.
In any case, Grilled would have to contend with a fresh goalie as the Tonners armband passed to Jurek Forma, but they would call Li's tactical wisdom into question soon enough. The change didn't seem to bolster confidence in the Tonners side, and they would start to withdraw deeper into their own half.
Lim An Keng exchanged sharp passes with Baena in the 71st only to rush his attempt, and Kalki would show him how it should be done four minutes on, when he waited former national U-2o defender Othman Hariry's tackle out, before depositing it neatly into the far corner with Frankenfeld caught out.
Kalki Parvathaneni was not done, and it transpired that he had been reserving his legs for a grand rally. Chitre would provide the catalyst, as his making a nuisance of himself just outside the box, would earn Grilled a free-kick upon drawing a foul from Wei Wen Beng.
Bhavya Panigrahi considered his options as
Chan Ze Han made a dummy approach, and sent it high for his teammates to contest.
Chia Kwang Tse couldn't get a clean take, but his glancing header was enough to allow Kalki to put it away.
Having equalized and with momentum very much in their favour, Grilled's next target would be to take victory here, and towards this they would throw
Gilbert Webb on for some reserve firepower. Unfortunately, all their efforts were for naught as the Tonners endured with a bit of luck, and it was instead Gay Ah Soon who came good at the other end, as neither Webb nor Hutter could catch him once he made his run.