No Relaxing Here
Fu Fighters
frunzelax might have lost their last three league fixtures by at least three goals, but they would show why they might belong in Division Two yet, with a 5-2 home thrashing of a sluggish-looking Grilled Birds team.
Dan Alstani had his attention mostly on the Sapphire Challenger Cup from his comments in the lead-up to the match, and it seemmed to have rubbed off on his players, few of whom looked up to the challenge, in contrast to the hosts.
A clear sign of Alstani's true focus would be his starting Greek reserve goalkeeper
Dimitris Germanakos for the first time in over two seasons, as a precaution after
Radomil Marcol sustained a minor foot injury during training on Friday. This turned out to be a bad idea with 25 year-old frunzelax star striker Jayadevan Satarkar in the form that he was, with the Number Seventeen finally opening his league account for the season in the tenth minute, against indifferent defending by
Aw Keng Chuan.
The assist had come from his English captain James Gill, and in all frankness frunzelax were beating the Birds at their own game. French gaffer Chadi Selawi had himself come under heavy criticism for his team's underperformance over the past month, that had seen them also crash out of the Ruby Challenger Cup to III.16 entrants Pitahaya FC. As it turned out, perhaps all the frunzelax players needed was to be unleashed, with Loh Jia Fu ridding himself of
Genki Nagano with a simple feint in the 18th minute, to drill a second past Germanakos.
It was transpiring to be a really bad day out for Grilled's 35 year-old veteran, whose reactions appeared a couple of steps below his prime. His teammates would recognize that their best hope was to keep the ball away from their own half, and
Chia Kwang Tse drew an unbelievable save off opposing custodian Jorge Catriman, 25 minutes in.
Hwang Teck Fu appeared to have put it in on the second chance, but the goal was disallowed as he went through Isaia Matrisciano to do it - and he would be booked to boot.
Hwang would still be contesting that decision with stoic German referee Alois Glodnick when the home team pushed upfield three minutes later, and Germanakos did nothing to redeem himself as Giovanni Guaiana notched a third in at his near post, following Adrian Nam's good approach work. It would take some good fortune from
Genki Nagano's seemingly-botched free-kick eight minutes on, as the apparent miskick made its way though to
Ananda Hettiarachchi at the side of the defensive wall, allowing the Sri Lankan midfielder to stick it past Catriman from ten yards.
Alstani could barely hide his distress by the time half-time came around, and whatever he said or did to the Grilled squad during the interval did seem to have an effect. The Birds came out the more dynamic team for once, with Chia in particular using his size to good effect against former Tanzanian youth international defender Felix Mporogomyi. Catriman kept out a couple of big headers from the Number Six, before
Lim An Keng got his forehead onto another free-kick setup for 3-2.
This was as far as Grilled got, however, as they succumbed to a one-two knockout combination from the hosts soon enough. Ecuadorean winger Walter Morán was in the right place somewhere after the far post as Nam's long pass made it all the way across 66 minutes in, with Li Fu Ze adding a fifth immediately after that, as the Birds advanced recklessly.
Chad Thach tried to keep his teammates going by setting an example from midfield, but he would find the going tough against young Romanian marker Alexandru Cozma, whose task was made only easier by the fact that he could concentrate wholly on it, with the scoreline being what it was. As it was, Selawi would be a picture of bliss as he made a double substitution to put up-and-coming youngsters Pradeep Karivardhan and Bryan Mian on for the final six minutes, with
Dan Alstani not even on the touchline as he tasked his assistant to oversee his own subs later on.
