It was familiar opponents this week as we headed to Mayflower Secondary for our weekly game. We last played Gaza in March and the notable thing about that game was not the victory but the way that the opponents were crying out for Max to be subbed out. Well, Max was there again and it seems likely a victory again for Incepcion.
As stand-in manager, I have not registered a victory and this is the 3rd and final chance for me to do so. I put out the lineup early and only Ben managed to catch a glimpse of it. After having promised Liverpool fans an extra 6 minutes of game time earlier in the week, I totally forgot about it on the pitch until Andy reminded me. This caused me to make some alterations to my plan. And it's probably because of this promise that Man U fans pulled out of the team this week. Colin was handed the captaincy for this game to assert himself.
We started very quickly and Andy probably scored the fastest goal this season. Netting after 1 minute from his usual hustle upfront. It was debatable as the ball seemed to have flicked off the opponents head but Andy got the goal for his hard work. It was clearly fast and furious for Incepcion as we quickly got our second goal in 5 minutes. Stuart laid on a delicious square ball to Ron who fired in a rocket to the top corner from almost 25 meters out. Cheers to him as it was his first goal from open play for a long time. Smooth sailing for us, nope. We decided to make things difficult for ourselves as we became complacent. A quick ball over the top to our left, which should have been offside, gave their speedy young winger space to run onto. Jay, our guest keeper, raced out of his box and could only fouled him. It was clearly out of the box but the referee gave a penalty. No mistake by the opponent and it was 2-1. About 10 minutes later, that same opponent sped through again. He coolly shot past Jay at the near post to equalize. It was clear that he was the danger man, more so when SK mentioned that we should try to sign him, which was flatly rejected by the opponents. That equalizer definitely took the sting out of us. Moreover, our star striker was having a brilliant off-day. He latched onto a defensive mistake by their last man, waddled through the middle and faced the goalkeeper. He should have shot, but he decided to dribble past him. Well, that didn't work as we all knew that wasn't his strength. He then had 2 further 1 on 1 which the goalkeeper kept out. We should sign their goalkeeper as well. We then introduced our own star player, Max. This was when we took a better control of the game as he kept the ball well and released it nicely for his team mates. It was one such ball in the 39th minute that Dave got to the end of, on the right wing. He crossed and our star striker in the box somehow missed it, but a on-rushing defender couldn't get out of the way and it bounced off him into goal. 3-2 at half-time. Very lucky to be in the lead.
During half-time, first question I asked the team, when I managed to get everyone together (that was the difficult part), was anyone happy with the result so far? Nobody really answered me but I can tell that they knew what was the answer. I stressed to them the effort that everyone makes to get there for a weekly game, so don't waste it. Don't let down your team mates who were trying as well. With that, I sent out the team for the 2nd half.
Within a minute of the restart, our star striker laid on a nice pass to Stuart who finished it off at the far post. I must mention that Stuart was playing well and deserved his goal, although he should have gotten a few more in the later stages of the game. Besides scoring, he actually laid on a nice pass for Colin to finish in the box. This was a toe-poke to the far post and obviously we can tell that our star striker was happy to get it after the embarrassment of his misses in the first half. That was in the 64th minute. 3 minutes later, Stuart again got to the byeline and put the ball across on a plate to Colin. He cannot miss. Open and with a gaping goal, he scored. You might be thinking that these 2 were the star of the show today. But in my opinion, Yiong was having a stormer! He was calm while playing in the middle and threaded numerous delicious through passes. It was actually his pass that Stuart crossed for Colin to score. His performance was outstanding to the point that the fans were calling him Iniesta. Strangely, the referee blew the final whistle 5 minutes shy of the 80 minutes. He probably want to end Gaza's misery as we were certainly romping all over them. Final score 6-2, an improvement on the scoreline from March.
A good win, I must say. But we needed a strong 2nd half to do this. We should have closed off the game by half-time but we didn't. We more than made up for it in the 2nd half. I want to highlight a few players today. Andy was all over the front line and was harassing them all the way. I wonder where did he get so fit suddenly. Besides his impressive work-rate, he even managed to do flicks and tight close control to get out some situations. He should have got another goal after being put through by our star striker but their goalkeeper made a very good save. Stuart was a very different player when he has the confidence. He worked hard and provided 3 assists today, a good return. The effort by the rest of the team were there too. It was good to see Jerome speeding down to try to get to a ball which was seemingly too long. Dave also tried to do the same at the other end, sprinting down to eventually get a corner. Final words from me before I sign off. Thank you for bearing with me while I make my recovery. It was refreshing to be shouting on the sidelines. Thank you for giving me a win to end my short stint. May LLLC take us forward to greater heights again.
Oh yes, I did honor my promise. Giving my fellow Liverpool fans the extra 6th minute! 6th Cup!
