All Too Heavy
Double Balk
S-League club HEBFC Tonners FC got their third victory in succession against Grilled Birds, this coming six seasons after they had last met in the third division. It turned out that while the Birds had improved, it was the same for the Tonners too, who had retained a number of their midfielders and forwards since that time. Slovakian right winger Michal Balkovič would stand out amongst those, as he erased the Birds' two-goal lead almost entirely by himself.
Other than Balkovič, a number of others such as Othman Hariry, Yong Siong Eng, Balasubramanian Teja, Gabriel Mazo Calvo and Tan Tse Kok would return too, with Gay An Soon and Myron Lam seated on the bench. Likewise, Grilled had many familiar names out to correct the record, chief amongst them
Aw Keng Chuan,
Lim An Keng and
Chad Thach - with goalkeeper
Dimitris Germanakos yet to forget the past lessons too.
BuddyBoys' Love Street Stadium would be the venue for this fourth round game, as the Tonners' new Vietnamese custodian Nguyễn Duy Thanh led them out. Their Italian head coach Andrea Migliozzi had them adopt a 4-5-1 after a 1-5 league thrashing by United Legends FC, against which Grilled could only attack. The spectators would not have long to wait for the first sparks, as a deep cross from
Aw Keng Chuan had
Brian Reddy's touch go barely wide in the third minute, and the instant goal-kick saw Serdar Emre Sazak leave
Chad Thach in the dust with his sharp turns - but Othman Hariry was expertly fended off by
Ha Qicai.
Grilled were not warned off by that dazzling counterattack as they pressed their case with urgency, and from how they broke the opposition lines with some regularity, it was probably not a bad tactic.
Brian Reddy would be the Birds' main outlet as he thrived in his alternate inverted winger role, and a timely switchover with
Hwang Teck Fu in the eleventh minute necessitated Nguyễn getting down fast for the save.
The Tonners were probably less convincing on defence than Migliozzi would have liked, but his gesticulating from the touchline had limited effect against a Grilled side getting into the flow of things.
Lim An Keng got the opening goal in the 24th minute as he caught
Gandhik Chitre's waist-level through pass neatly on the turn for a great volley, while
Brian Reddy brute-forced a second goal on the kick-off return.
That had the downtown club's supporters seated disbelievingly as they countenanced being two down in a flash, but credit to Tonners, this was a team that wouldn't be broken just yet. Nguyễn would try to rally his troops from the rear, and after they survived a 31st minute score from
Chia Kwang Tse, this was exactly what happened. Gabriel Mazo Calvo led the charge from the left as Reddy struggled to recover, and Michal Balkovič buried it after coming to meet the low cross early.
Balkovič's strike gave his team that extra zest they sought, and for the first time in the match, they would start taking the action to Grilled instead. As not unexpected, this would have the Birds under the cosh as they tried to adjust to defending, and loose marking from the midfielders had Balasubramanian Teja equalizing from Tan Tse Kok's superb return cross, after floating wide right.
Chad Thach was booked into the bargain, for taking Tan out after the fact.
The second half thus began with it all square again, and it would prove a far more even affair with the Tonners having found many of Grilled's patterns out by this point. And yet, it could have been so different had
Gandhik Chitre managed to put more on his shot after scooting in from the right 65 minutes in, but as it was, Nguyễn just about got a strong left hand to the shot. Tonners were then off and away down the right wing, from which Michal Balkovič finally put them ahead after Andrea Mariano sought him out at the far post.
It was Grilled Birds' turn to fight from behind, and they did not disappoint either, as they pounded the Tonners straight from the restart. An initial foray by
Lim An Keng went nowhere, but it got a lot more promising once the ball got recycled, and
Paulino Trindade drove it across goal for
Brian Reddy to slam it high into the roof of the net, just two minutes after Balkovič's strike.
Most of the fans were on the edge of their seats now, and the match only got the more gripping as the Birds again went for broke... only for
Chad Thach to hammer a left-footed piledriver back down off the crossbar. Balkovič needed no second signal as he sped down the right to feed Tan Tse Kok for a classic counterattacking goal, at which Yong Siong Eng came on for Balasubramanian Teja. Stoppage time saw Grilled throw everybody up top for one last go, only to be stung by Bogdănel Giurgiu after Othman Hariry won the header deep in his own box.
