Reap The Hurricane
Birds Blow In
Today's friendly against Crown Haven Hurricanes FC at Gale Grounds inevitably reminded many of the Birds of home, from the thermometer breaching thirty degrees of humid heat. The Bahamas IV.57 hosts did at least not make it too difficult for their guests, who reciprocated by not putting too much of an emphasis on defending, which resulted in two goals for the Hurricanes.
Founded by expats hailing from Germany's BSG Traktor Rieth, the Hurricanes have bought thoughtfully under French boss Richard Daniel, whose latest signing was widely-hailed Norwegian teenaged goalie Arnfinn Aa for just over half a million. Aa was rightly first on the teamsheet for today's game, but he would last just three minutes before having to pick the ball out of his own net. He had evidently expected Ashton Burrows to have stuck more closely to
Gandhik Chitre as he scooped
Paulino Trindade's simple pass up on the edge of the box, but nothing of that sort happened as Chitre banged it hard in off the near post.
There would be much more of that to come, with
Chia Kwang Tse next to benefit from Trindade's largesse, but the Hurricanes were not about to let such irrelevant details get them down. They would merrily attack Grilled in their standard 4-4-2 whenever they could, and Adam Beneby revealed why he had been such a crowd-pleaser, as he gave
Toma Tamiya the run-around in the 18th minute.
Mohsen El Khateeb slid in far too hastily, and Beneby sidestepped gracefully to finish past a diving
Dimitris Germanakos.
The home fans were up and dancing at that, and their cheer would be sustained despite
Lim An Keng and
Chia Kwang Tse making it 4-1 by the half-hour mark. The rest of the first half saw Trindade try to make his own shot in the 37th minute as he cut across Robert Cartwright to great effect, only to have Aa redirect it onto the woodwork with the barest of contact. German winger Marko Rosaleck tried his luck with a tumble after bumping into
Damian Hutter, but was called out for it by the referee.
Dahan Bok replaced Germanakos in goal for the Birds after the break, and had precious little to do as his teammates took the game to their hosts. Grilled took to busting their way though the centre with overburdened Danish midfielder Marko Živković unable to cover as much ground as he had previously, which had
Chad Thach and
Mohd Marzuki Khairul score in the 59th and 62nd respectively.
Toma Tamiya then made it seven for Grilled, with Trindade again unguardable down the left.
The three-thousand odd locals kept their voice up, and would be rewarded when Živković found himself alone confronting
Dahan Bok, after David Nairn outraced Hutter. They didn't even mind much when a soft handball call led to
Toma Tamiya upping the scoreline to 8-2 from the penalty spot, nor when
Gandhik Chitre stole one more in added time.
