Javatos Jumbled
Teo Takeback
Today's flight to Madrid to play VI.388 club Real Javatos CF saw Grilled Birds prevail 6-0, with their open attacking game a couple of levels above what Javatos' relatively-static 5-4-1 could handle. Javatos had just endured a relegation from Division Five, and from the looks of it, Tanzanian boss Christopher Zitto's revival plans are very much a work in progress.
Latest signing Simo Velichkov would start at leftback for Javatos today, and the 17 year-old Bulgarian would not disgrace himself against
Paulino Trindade - although the overall picture was another matter.
Evandro La Face showed himself frighteningly adept at picking up on the reactions of the defence as he parked himself unobtrusively in a corner of the six-yard box in the third minute, which had it soon all open up nicely for him. Sekani Nkadimeq forced him wide just in time, however, and it went into the side netting.
It would then be
Gandhik Chitre to sound the first gong, as
Joe Reece dragged the backline towards him in the 12th minute, with his artful dribbling. It simply wasn't
Evandro La Face's half with local goalie Tan Siping having a blinder against him, making no less than three exceptional saves;
Radovan Jaška and
Mohsen El Khateeb would find success though, which made it 3-0 by half-time.
Federico Parada replaced Ferzan during the interval, just in time for the Birds to win an indirect free-kick after Tan took a few steps too many with the ball in the penalty area, while trying to regain his balance. Most everybody parked themselves inside for that, and
Radovan Jaška would backheel it after a long setup, for
Chad Thach to work the angles.
Joe Reece was the final target, but he would be thoroughly boxed in by then.
The pace of the match would slow till the 70th minute, when a 40 year-old
Teo Chuan Yong came in for Mohsen. Grilled would start to raise the stakes again with their midfield getting reactivated, and
Gandhik Chitre would make a tremendous dash from the right in the 78th minute, that required Tan to make a barely-there fingertip pushover for the corner. The original take would be cleared, but Trindade lobbed it straight to the back post, where
Chad Thach had unwisely been left unattended. That made it 4-0!
Ezequiel Vivonis was waiting to enter for Fabricius Schindlbeck then, which was also about when it finally clicked for
Evandro La Face. Tan Siping had been his nemesis for much of the day, pulling off numerous stops that should have been goals in all honesty. Ironically, La Face would come good on a relative half-chance, after holding forth in a bad position some twenty yards out. He hit it hard and true, however, and it was in before Tan could react.
There would be one more with
Teo Chuan Yong rolling back the years, as the veteran midfielder demonstrated the composure that had seen him win two S-League titles with the club. The volley was technically difficult with it coming in on his weaker foot and Vivonis bearing down, but a little stutter step would solve both those issues in one fell swoop.
Paulino Trindade then rocked the left post in the very next minute, as La Face went off for
Chan Ze Han right at the end.
