What's A Point
Pham Springs Trap
The Birds seemed to have lived dangerously and survived against Ambush F.C. at Ang Mo Kio's Hab Sukan Singapura, but they took their foot off the pedal prematurely - and were made to pay for it by the hosts' never-say-die attitude.
The sole meeting between the clubs had occured in the Singapore Cup at this very stadium ten years ago, which saw
Chan Ze Han and
Bilal Mohammad Harun responsible for Grilled's 3-0 win then. Both of them were, remarkably, on the Birds' bench today, but it would be twenty-two fresh faces to contend with each other. Former national U-20 winger Jimmy Pham would captain Ambush F.C. after returning from Italian Division Five side Sao Baba, where he had spent the better part of two seasons after a similar stint at Arcturules. 26 year-old Good Luck FC youth team graduate Yip Jin, who arrived about a month before Pham, would also start in midfield.
Given the coterie of stars that head coach Chow Pin Qiang had painstakingly assembled over the last few seasons, them losing two of their first three league matches had to be a slight disappointment, although one could hardly fault them for falling against Haha last Wednesday. Chow had rested a number of his best players for that, it has to be said, and trainee Kevin Salve's injury probably supported his decision.
Reputations had never served a strong role in the Birds' games, though, and any remaining pretensions as to squad strength on paper would be stripped bare by
Mohd Marzuki Khairul's third minute goal, that followed unexpectedly-positive approach work from
Aw Keng Chuan. The Birds would be reminded of their own frailties within five minutes, as ex-Glory Paradiso prodigy Mahmoud El Omda took
Chia Kwang Tse and then
Ha Qicai on in turn, beating both to slot it past
Dimitris Germanakos on his left.
Word from the grapevine was that Grilled were wrestling with a dip in form, and it sounded mostly true as passes went astray at a noticeably higher rate than usual. This had Aw being slow to the tackle against Wil Tai in the 16th minute, and the quick free-kick went directly to Yip Jin, who lobbed it hard and flat over Germanakos from the corner of the box.
Chad Thach then received a yellow card too from experienced Swiss referee Ueli Wolfmaier for simulation, with Germanakos having to make a flying save against Liew Qiang Ze several minutes on.
The rest of the first half had Ambush F.C. hold Grilled off with some difficulty, with Mak De Wai working especially hard to fend the strikers off. The Birds were a changed team coming off the break, however, and regained much of the fire that had seen them slay all comers for the past few weeks. Two minutes into the half, they had the home team's defensive line tilting hard towards the left after busy running there by
Hwang Teck Fu, which left
Lim An Keng feasting on the open invitation to shoot, once the ball came back to him. 2-2!
It still felt like anybody's game then, even as the hosts returned to a more active style via Kee Kok Hui. The Birds were the ones asking most of the questions now, though, and Tajuddin Ridwan Taqiuddin only just kept
Aw Keng Chuan out after
Brian Reddy's pullback to the near post, 54 minutes in. The pressure kept mounting as Grilled tried from all directions, and
Chad Thach would be the one to solve Ambush F.C.'s otherwise fundamentally-excellent defence, with a sweet bit of ball-playing to free himself from Li Su Yi for an instant, before ripping it into the net.
Grilled looked to have completed their conquest when
Chia Kwang Tse made full use of the opponents being momentarily dazed to up Grilled to four, on
Paulino Trindade's following assist. A blistering rallying speech by Jimmy Pham on the sidelines as the Birds celebrated had its effecet, though, and they threw all they had into the restart, leaving just Mak back against two Grilled forwards. They just about won this toss of the dice as
Raúl Himadas couldn't clear far enough, and Wil Tai would drill it high into goal, to leave the home fans wanting more.
The Birds were certainly less eager to get the match going again, than Ambush F.C. had been, and they seemed to have succeeded in dragging it out to a probably-undeserved victory - including some seconds from
Gandhik Chitre dallying as he came on. With the two added minutes almost over, however, another devil-may-care rush from the hosts saw Taylor Pham put clear by Mawardi Abdul Hakim, and he found the target to send Hab Sukan Singapura into rapture.