Match #1 (26 Dec 2011): Keenly-Contested Match, A Narrow Win. A Good Start, Nevertheless.

Against Kok Seng's Blues, who were so kind to accomodate us in our new kit that they turned up in red, we knew we were in for something. We thought we had an impressive turnout of 19 players, they had more than 20, including four 'foreign talents'. Despite their strong line-up in the 1H, we could have comfortably settled the match by half-time if we had converted those chances created. Instead, we had a narrow 2-1 lead. 1st goal resulted from a piece of individual brilliance on the right by Teck Chye, who twisted and turned (i should have simply used 'tormented') KS' Blues' last man before setting up Simon for our opening goal of the season. Nice defending work on the right from See Chiang, Woon and then Teck Wah led to Yong Chua to have his time to measure up a shot from outside the box that beat their keeper hands down. 2-0. We seemed to be cruising but one of their foreign talents produced a brilliant volley that had Gan, our stand-in keeper, surprisingly beaten. 2-1 at the break.

KS' Blues had the better of possession in 2H but in one of our few rare forays into the offensive third, Chor Guan produced a needle-eye through ball to set up Gan to toe poke the ball into the net. KS' Blues refused to be beaten and their playmaker, No 32 intercepted the pass between Yong Chua and Chor Guan and went on to shoot from distance. The ball took a wicked swerve and Brandon was left grasping for air. 3-2 but we held on somehat nervously to win the keenly contested tie.