Justin had the opportunity to lead the devotion before kick-off and he encouraged everyone to think about what the 'game plan' for their life was and to ask simple questions like 'what am I living for?' and 'what is life about?' In good spirits before kick-off, the Panthers also took their team photo. Looks good doesn't it?
Ronnie had already done the briefing before the worship/devotion. We were going to start with a 4-4-2 to have balance across the field. Mark and James also decided to start 'flat' instead of playing sweeper.
We knew we were in for a rough time when the speedy opponents immediately used their pace, skill and good first touch to get down our flanks and even down the middle. We tried hard to keep up and break up the play, but could not keep possession long enough to create any chances of our own. However, around the 10th minute mark, an opportunity fell to us to take the lead. The TCFC GK's wayward clearance fell into the path of Marcus and as he fired the ball goalwards, the TCFC GK was still scrambling back to his line. Fortunately for TCFC, the ball canonned off the left-hand post and out to safety. That seemed to fire up TCFC even more and they stroked the ball around for wave after wave of attack, closing us down quickly even when we had possession. We had to thank Sean for keeping it goal-less at this point but the inevitable was realised. From a slick move down the middle, a through ball was floated to a TCFC player on the left, who saw Sean off his line and deftly chipped the ball into goal. From there, TCFC pressed on and got their 2nd. This time, it was a move down the right, with a cross met by TCFC's speedy #9 and tournament top scorer to fire past Sean. Before the 2nd half ended, we were 3-0 down, with the #9 again making his way into the box and even though denied first by Sean, and then a tackle, was still quicker to the ball than the defence to fire in his 2nd goal of the game. We defended hard and managed to keep it at 3-0 when the referee blew for half-time.
Ronnie encouraged us to be hungrier and quicker to the ball during the team talk and to string some moves to take the fight to TCFC. A re-shuffle also saw Jimmy coming on for Mark as sweeper and Marcus moving to left-back, with Kevin pushing up. This steadied the ship a bit as Marcus had more speed to cope with the wing attacks. The 1st 15 minutes of the 2nd half was all ours as we pressed for a goal. We had a couple of half-chances in the box and a couple of corners to threaten but nothing materialised. Timothy and Rusydi were having an excellent 2nd half and Derrick and Kee Min were protecting the defence with their hard running and tackling. Some frustration settled into the TCFC team at this point and they resorted to some ankle tapping, which left Jimmy asking the referee to be more mindful of what was going on. The resulting 'heated exchange' between the TCFC players, us and the referee saw the TCFC Captain yellow carded.
Ronnie made a tactical switch at this point by bringing Felipe on for Justin. With us pressing forward, TCFC was left with long range efforts and nothing much to show for. When they did get an opportunity, Sean was there to save the day with some close range saves. On the offensive end, wingplay down the right from Rusydi allowed breaks into the box, but the final balls could have been better. One stray cross though found Kevin all the way on the left and he fired a stiff shot just high of the bar. He was then replaced with Bevan coming on at left midfield. For the rest of the match, we tried to find the goal, but even Kee Min's one-on-one situation with the GK did not result in a conversion. Try as we did, no goal was scored but by the time the final whistle was blown, we held our heads high for not capitulating after the 1st half display. It was a hard fought goal-less 2nd half and definitely something that we can take pride in.
Here's hoping that our ethic will carry over into our next match against Wesley Methodist Church.
2 comments:
I gotta admit i put 110% for this game but ended up lacking the good final touch.
Some
1) My through ball to kee was abit too hard.
2) I should try a shot instead of squaring the ball on one incident.
However, there are 1 or 2 incident if Felipe noticed me on his right!
Well, I believe we played well overall.
Yes, you definitely put in your best performance so far. All the good moves in the 2nd half went through your feet.
We'll work together and keep up the good work for this Sunday's match. Hopefully the marathon won't take out so much from you and you'll have some chance to rest before.
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