Memmingen Make Do
Téllez Like It Is
Grilled began their El Balon del Mundo adventure with a two-all draw against Paraguay Third Division leaders Paraguayos Memmingen, and it was hard to determine whether it should be considered as two points dropped, or a point won. The Birds enjoyed the vast majority of the possession, only to end up scrapping to avoid an opening day defeat.
On paper, the Birds should have been more than a match for this Memmingen side, but their opponents were riding high after a series of convincing wins; most recently, they had swept luibatta aside 7-1 in the league, with their homegrown "Triple A" front three of Ariel Zabrodiec, Aldo Téllez and Arturo Ortigoza flaunting extremely fluent interchanges going forward.
Midfield had always been Paraguayos Memmingen's Achilles heel, but somehow Grilled were unable to fully capitalize on this deficiency. They kept the ball with a practised economy, but lacked a certain derring-do in attack. With former Georgian national youth winger Ramaz Nadaraia sticking to
Wong Ping Shun, and
Clark Won being conservative on the other flank, Grilled struggled to muster a breakthrough.
Tian Yonghang appeared rightly disappointed at all the possible options gone begging, but it went little better when
Zhao Jing Wei tried to force his way through, which left Argentine right winger Gonzalo Solomonoff free to charge in the 21st minute. Memmingen wove their intricate patterns at this, which left Téllez at liberty to drill it past
Wong Tian Han after a sharp exchange.
Grilled improved slightly after that, but would be beset by poor luck. Tian for one pulled off a showstopping rabona that even some opposing fans applauded, but Shawn Deheug made a point-blank save from
Mohd Safri bin Mohd Kassim despite Cuauhtémoc Hermosillo being completely taken out. Four minutes later,
Lee Lee Hao looked odds-on to level, but Hermosillo redeemed himself with a courageous block at full stretch.
Téllez was giving the Birds' defence something to think about too, but it was almost all Grilled for the remainder of the half. They thought that they had won a penalty in the 36th, after Eligio Echeverria appeared to clip
Lee Lee Hao as they were chasing
Clark Won's through pass, but the referee instead took it as a dive. A furious Won ran up to remonstrate, and was booked for his pains.
The Birds could justly feel aggrieved at going into the break still behind, and came out fired up; Memmingen were genuinely uncomfortable for the first time in the contest as Grilled pressed from all angles, and they would finally crack. Fifty-one minutes in,
Clément Meyer saw his chance after several abortive runs had opened up Memmingen's stubborn central defence, and raced through to equalise.
It was not going well for Memmingen, and Swiss head coach Benjamin Bachtold introduced José Serpa for the slowing Antúnez, apparently with a mission to clog it up. This Serpa achieved to some extent, but his major contribution was certainly helping to clear the air in defence. Raúl Vicente Oda could hardly be blamed for not able to contain Grilled's playmakers, but then again, Memmingen were beginning to get used to their patterns.
With the status quo maintained into the final ten minutes, both teams made one last shake-up, as they readied their substitutions simultaneously -
Rinor Isufi would get his opportunity, as he went in for Zhao, while Benito Romero subbed for Eliyahu Kolesnik in a direct response.
For that, Memmingen gave all the signs of desperately hanging on for the draw... when it all came together for them in the 86th minute. An umpteenth cross from
Wong Ping Shun had been headed clear and far by Serpa, but this time,
Clément Meyer misjudged the flight. Alert to a fault, Ariel Zabrodiec immediately poked it in the general direction of Grilled's goal, and who would be there but Téllez? He beat
Gene Filippone in a frantic footrace, before just about scuffing it beyond Wong, as the goalkeeper went down a fraction late.
Memmingen were euphoric, but it turned out to be a little too early for celebrations, for Grilled's turn would arrive shortly. Memmingen should probably have been able to shut the Birds out, had they simply drawn back in numbers, but a cheeky attempt to take it to the corner was cut out by
Yuki Irie. A couple of well-placed passes later,
Tian Yonghang was presented with a clear look from just inside the penalty area, and he calmly took aim at the top left corner - and scored.
The opposition players were shaken by that, and Grilled had a shot at stealing it, but Solomonoff just about pulled his men together to preserve the tie.
