Match #44 (26 Oct 08): Drab 1-1 draw at MJC

MJC, the venue of our abject humiliation! a 3pm fixture added to our foreboding. the sun had hidden behind the clouds all day but upon kick-off, it duly came to greet us with its warm smile

:( Team 89 consists of a motley bunch. there are youngsters with speed and flash, and there are some looking like misfits but could do the basics. in terms of personnel, quantity or otherwise, they ought to benefit from the conditions.

both teams took their time on the wide expanse of the pitch, spraying ball back and forth but without much penetration. therefore, the first breakthrough came from a set piece. off a corner viciously swung in by Team 89, MS players, like Arsenal were guilty of slack marking, allowing an easy stab home. the cat and mouse game continued as the humidity took its toll. sensing a static defence and wah ready wide out on the left, st clipped a delicious chip into the box. wah pounced with his lefty, keeper looked dazzled as the ball looped across him, and gan sneaked in from the right to slot the ball into the far corner.

and those were mainly the action. not much drama except the inconsequential (to us) vehement arguments amongst some Team 89 players over nothing that we could fathom. a rather unsatisfying afternoon was undelined by the fact that Team 89 immediately placed us for a rematch in nov at FTPSS. both sides probably thought their glass was half empty.

Match #43 (18 Oct 08): Roma Orange Crush

on a super hot day, that's what we need! opponent's name is Orange and they wore Roma's jerseys. being crushed was simply not the expected outcome, but it was. the first 5 minutes didn't give us much encouragement. simply put, in that space of time, they had 2 simple shots on goal which give seah no bother at all. thankfully, seah was to continue picking up simple shots the rest of the day. soon, our defence was simply imposing themselves with chiang meeting any dangers spot on, leo & wen stepping up on their wide men and kwan providing solid cover. surprising in the narrow orchid park pitch, there was space and time in the middle for us. st took advantage of that, measured a cross field ball over the defender and teck wah's endeavor earned a corner. his simple but accurate cross was emphatically met by yc's head into the far corner. both teams then simply labored in the hot sun and the half time whistle was most welcomed.

we simply got off to a quick start in the second half. wah measured a simple ball into the path of terk and continued his run into the box. terk, not simply had to fight off 2 defenders to nick the ball across goal causing confusion. wah needed no invitation to slam the ball home with his left foot. then more perserverance from terk on the right to square a simply dangerous ball into box for gan was met by a thumping 'clearance' from their skipper. oh what a simple way to score a goal without needing to aim! by now, Orange seemed a little demoralised and out of juice. they played a high line, simply hoping for the best. tony the ref, famed for simply giving offsites had saved them a couple of times to the chagrin of wah and mike. but we were not to be denied. off another superb interception in our half, we sprayed the ball to the right for our guy to put a teasing through ball across to the left. st chased down the ball and with one defender to beat, he go for the simple. a neat rolled pass to wah in the middle presented him an easy one on one. He simply rolled it in for his double.

and that's a simple and effective 4-0 win. keep it simple!

Match #42 (11 Sep 08): Clash of the Water

report contributed by kh

With a name like Ocean 15, we could not be faulted for our initial apprehension. We thought we would be facing a bunch of footballers with some scheming tactics. Even their mastermind captain oozes the charm of George Clooney. But given their turnout, they should have just sticked to the original movie title, Ocean 11 or even, perhaps Only 11.
The match could have been billed as the clash of the water. C'mon, after all, it was Ocean v Marine. In the end, the results portrayed a journey down the water slide for O15, 7-1! That was after we were awakened by the splash of cold water by them for having conceded an early goal to them. It was not durian picking for Marine Sunday, more like oyster harvesting with such score line.

Before we could string 20 passes, we let their playmaker, No 5, have too much room to weave through us like a slippery eel. His low cross across the 6-yards box had Seah fully stretched to cover but our keeper only managed to divert the ball into the path of their awaiting striker. By then, the covering Weng Kwan was unfortunately caught flatfooted by the diversion and O15's striker put the ball past him for a shocking lead.

It was a rude awakening and Chor Guan chided at our impotency upfront and began to ski forward. Despite his archilles tendon injury, his swift movements equalized for us. Gan did not give up chasing after what looked like a lost cause. O15's last man seemingly had the ball covered but under pressure exerted by Gan, he could have cleared the ball away instead of waiting for his keeper to do so. The keeper's clearance was poor, and Chor Guan picked up the loose ball and shot past the stranded keeper. 1-1.

Even Chwee Leng had a resurgent of form, or shall we say, luck? We all know how hard it is to open up an oyster but in this case, the oyster literally opened itself in front of Chwee Leng for him to caress! An innocuous-looking hanging ball should be easy for the keeper to at least punch it away. Chwee Leng, sandwiched between the keeper and a defender, looked up trying to avoid the fist of the keeper but could not avoid the ball, resulting in the ball cannoning off his head into the open goal. Chwee Leng of course vehemently protested to this version of report and sought the Dubious Goal Committee for mediation. After viewing the replay, it was agreed to digitalize the action and showed that Chwee Leng outjumped the keeper and defender to head the ball into the net. 2–1. The dam began to creak.

Gan had 2 soft headers to account for but each posed no threat to O15 until Simon put things in perspective with one of his 101-ways to score a goal simply. Even then, his goal came with a fair measure of luck again. No, the oyster did not spread itself open but it was quite similar to fishing in the river and out of nowhere, a dumb fish just jumped out of the water onto the boat. Again, O15's custodian needs to master the art of punching the ball away. This time round, he did but he needs to punch the ball away out of danger, not across into the box and worse to an opponent player! This was what he did, punching the ball to Simon in the box. What did the keeper expect us to do? Returned the ball to him? Actually, Simon did. He passed the ball back to keeper but it was a tad too hard that the keeper could not reach it in time. 3–1! And the score stayed that way till half-time.

O15 resumed the 2nd half with the same slickness as they did in the early stages of 1st half. After shooting wide in an early foray into our box, they began to lose steam. Despite our possession, we could not extend our lead until the last 20 minutes of the match. Tiredness set in for O15 and floodgate opened. After seeing his earlier shot saved by the keeper, Teck Wah attempted the same wallop at goal. Again, O15 custodian was up to it and palmed the ball, only for Gan heading the rebound into the net. 4-1. With 1 player down due to injury, the numerical disadvantage further exacerbated the situation for O15. Gan pounced onto the tentative defending of their sweeper and managed to rob the ball away from him. With only the keeper at his disposal, Gan shot past the keeper with relative ease. 5-1. Gan then intercepted a ball that was bound for the safety hands of their keeper. Gan clawed the ball back to Yong Chua, less than 6-yards from goal, but the latter's left-footed shot skied the ball. But YC atoned for that embarrassing miss when he took it into his own hands to conjure up goal No 6 – produced, directed and acted by himself! He intercepted a poor goal-kick just outside the box, beat a defender and this time round, his left-footed attempt recorded a success! Third-time-lucky was the theme in our 7th goal. Whilst Teck Wah failed to convert with his earlier 2 attempts, his 3rd try paid off. Chwee Leng, yes, Chwee Leng indeed, accurately picked out Chor Guan with his throw-in and Guan's header landed at Teck Wah's feet, whose half volley finally got past the keeper.

We were hunting for more oysters but by now, even the crabs had gone into hiding in the seabed. The tides began to recede and it was wise that O15's vessels decided to dock at the port for overhaul.

Match #41 (4 Oct 2008): We trailed for the 4 consecutive match and .....

sep had started with a loss to shocking pink after a comfortable lead. then we reverse the trend by winning the rest of the month with come-from-behind wins for each of the matches. yesterday, we followed the same pattern of falling behind. the question was whether we could reverse Sep's record of starting with a loss with the same come-from-behind approach (i didn't mean anwar).

VS teachers has always been difficult to beat. we lost more to them over the course of our encounters, but each time, we seemed to have the measure of them. this time was no different. we had more of the possession and movements in the first 30mins and a win seemed probable. our cross field balls into the box caused problems for their defence. we peppered a couple of shots which showed our superiority. wah whipped in a cross from the left and st, coming in from right mid controlled the ball neatly with his thigh but fired over under no pressure. then VS pushed up on our freekick, but leo cleverly beat the trap. alas the ball just wouldn't come down fast enough for leo to connect and the opportunity was snuffed. and so the old adage had to be fulfilled. you get punished if you don't take your chances. on a counter-attack (how often we hear that!), VS had the ball pumped into our box. seah came out and the ball decided to shy away from him and nifty 'bowser' ran past seah and squared the ball into space. despite wen's valiant effort to cover from his right back position, the striker had an easy task of tucking in the sitter. soon, 'bowser' strikes again. his special skill of bouncing off opponents before getting to the ball was not punished by the ref. with his shorter height and low cg, he found hleong's soft spot and attacked it good. hleong tussled but was no match for the pro. 'bowser' left hleong to lick his wounds on the green turf and proceeded to square the ball for gelek skinny to score with a scuffed volley. half time 0-2 down. any comeback on the cards?

second half resumed and within minutes, the question was more or less answered. you've got to give it to VS for their teamwork for all their goals was scored because they knew where to put the ball without trying too hard to be precise in picking up any specific person. they know what to do when they have the ball and when they don't have the ball. and so goal number 3 came. adding to our misery, the coup de grace goal number 4 was classy. botak sng had come on in the second half and in our previous encounters, he had always caused damage. this time, his whole team cheered the way he jiggled his hips, leaving seah on the floor before rolling the ball into the empty net. at this point, the ref thought we were going to get nothing from this match. but ms being ms, things suddenly clicked but a little too late. perhaps VS took their feet off the pedals and we pressed more at the same time. we got 2 carbon-copy tang brothers' specials with elder feeding through balls for younger to run into and applied his usual reliable finish.

and so it finished 2-4 for oct. a similar start to sep. end of a superb come-from-behind run. the question is: "what's next?"