MAN OF THE MATCH : Everyone in the squad was outstanding so no individual award to any one player.
MOST APPEARANCES SO FAR: Andy B/Jay 7
STATS : We are now 5th but it’s very tight near the bottom so we got to keep winning to stay out of there. We have scored the 3rd most goals in the League (13 in 7) and we have the 2nd best defense (conceded 8 in 7). This is something to build on.
Congratulations to all the squad who turned out against J Leagers at the weekend. We put in an extremely professional performance and destroyed J Leagers in a pretty one sided affair. As usual we played in a 4 – 4 – 1 – 1 formation with the following line up: Dan, Sean, Bertie, Jay, Olivier, Jack, Rob, Randy, Coombes and Michael J. On the bench we had Pablo, Andy B, Joe, Jeremy, the Vera family and the Mancke family who would give us some impetus once they came on.
Our defense has generally played well all season and our back five put in another commanding shift. They worked well as a group, were strong and read the game extremely well. We built on this foundation with the oppo only having one meaningful shot at the end of the half. Our two new signings of Jack and Adam had very good debuts and Adam’s boozy day at HKCC on Friday seemed not to effect him despite the heat and constantly kept running at the oppo and went past them getting some shots and good crosses in. Rob showed his class once again but it the was braun of Randy who muscled through and tapped in our opener after a Matt cross. Moments later he got a header in which should have made it 2 – 0. We then tried a few experiments with Leandro going on up front and Mike Vera coming into midfield.
The oppo struggled with Leandro’s presence and Mike must have had a few red bulls as he ran all over them and then from an Adam shot which was saved Mike tapped in to make it 2 – 0 and get his first goal of the season. Moments later a cross from the left found Jeremy who came on for Jack and cracked a side foot into the bar. At half time we have a chat about working hard defensively and as expected J Leagers come at us and we struggled a little but we dig deep and we block and tackle and Dan makes a few saves.
After an initial 15 minutes we settle back into our rhythm and Joe who finds himself up front is set up by MJ and finishes well to make it 3 – 0 and its game over. Funny comments on the side from the newbies who thought Joe was German. Glad to see Bastien is playing so well for us again. The last ten minutes saw Henry Vera and Andy B come of for brief cameos. Michael J also went close on a few occasions and was unlucky not to score having a very good game. A few of us go off to the Brew House for a late lunch celebration.
