Roses Ringed
Thach And Go
Former Persian Gulf Cup winners Magical Roses would arrive from Tehran for this week's friendly, but it would hardly be a contest at The Cooking Pot as Mexican head coach Sagrario Escoto elected to assess his second-stringers. Without the likes of Gustaw Boryna and Djarrtjuntjun Toihau involved, there was no way that the Roses would be able to halt Grilled's selection. Their German captain-goalkeeper Swen Endredine gave all he had, but it was far from enough.
The league had not been kind to Roses either, with them having just lost two straight in the Iranian III.7, but none of that was Escoto's priority as he instructed them to attack with all they had. Given that this was essentially an U-20 squad, however, they would be comprehensively overwhelmed by the Birds in both strength and skill, with
Paulino Trindade showing Bagher Sheybani just how much further he had to go, with a committed run in the sixth minute. The cross was true, and
Mohd Marzuki Khairul floated in from nearly the edge of the box, to nod it home.
Roses picked themselves up and fell back on dogged man-marking, which got them through the next twenty minutes without conceding. That laudable run ended with
Toma Tamiya's charge and strike in the 26th, however, which would itself be followed by
Chad Thach also going direct by himself, three minutes on. 18 year-old Greek midfielder Michalis Mpalamoutidis received the first yellow of the game for delaying play later in the half, after which Thach thundered one off the left post, and Toma hoofed the resulting free-kick over.
Three-nil it was at the end of the half, after which
Radovan Jaška came on for
Toma Tamiya. It did not take long after the restart for the Birds to find a fourth, as
Gandhik Chitre strolled slowly towards goal from thirty yards out, seemingly harmlessly. A swish of the boot would then have him break into a loping run, from which a simple sway sent Amado Luís Costa hurtling to the grass on his own accord. Chitre didn't rub it in after placing the ball in the net, at least.
Still, the home supporters sure enjoyed that flaunting of dribbing nous, and the young Roses were stretched thin trying to cover all angles. Even having long abandoned any effort at attacking, it remained a handful trying to keep up with Grilled's far more seasoned veterans, and it was quite incredible that they lasted till the 62nd minute before a second booking. Belize winger Micah Lynshue was late in catching Trindade's back foot, and accepted the referee's decision tamely.
Chitre continued being one of Grilled's liveliest players as he sped up the left before skinning his shot off the turf and over the bar in the 69th minute, before
Lim An Keng buried
Radovan Jaška's cross to the near post, three minutes later. A deflected free-kick was then polished off by
Chad Thach in the 75th, with Jaška's day blemished by an unnecessary yellow for grabbing Jurijonas Tadaras rather unsubtly after the Lithuanian youngster had gotten past him, late on.
