City Get the Last Laugh
Time: 5.30pm, February 8th, 2010
Venue: Bai Ling Bridge Riverside Park
By Michael Christie
Agreeing to put the start of the match back to 5.30, the match referee wasn’t very sympathetic to the eight City players kitted up at 5.25 when asked to delay it further. Still, within seconds of a 4-3-0 formation taking the field, Dawda, Tim, Mamadi, Ebou and Yunusa arrived. Niklas also showed up, but he’d lost the keys to his rooms so he didn’t have a kit and had to watch from the sidelines.
The starting line-up was Matt Wharton in goal; John Phillips, Tim Murphy, Mamadi Colley, and Yunusa Njie at the back; Spencer Pangborn, Oliver Harley, Ebrima Njie, and Ed Cartee in midfield; and, Stevey Reymond and Dawda Fatty up front. The Lions started the game with hard running. City kept the ball a lot but the passing was slow and often predictable, so the game was even for the first twenty minutes. Worryingly, Onur Dogan was in good form and looked threatening every time he had the ball. He was an effective outlet for the Lions, carrying the ball into the penalty box. One time he outpaced everybody and only a memorable tackle from Murphy stopped him.
The City attack created some openings in the first twenty minutes but rarely tested the Lions keeper. The wide players were not used enough, and the Lions were content to soak up pressure through the centre. With about twenty-five minutes gone, Onur Durgan was through again and this time he got a hard shot off which Wharton palmed away. The ball bounced back to the Lions ten yards from the box, where City conceded a free-kick. Driving hard and low, the ball took a deflection off the wall and Volker Nagel was in the right place to poke it home past Wharton. This was a lucky goal for the Lions, but no more than they deserved.
City came back with conviction but made no new inroads after the goal. City kept the ball well, but were restricted to long shots and corners. Shortly before the half-time whistle, Dan Calvert came on for Spencer Pangborn.
Begining the second half, Michael Christie replaced Oliver Harley. There didn’t seem to be much happening when, without any great effort, the Lions threaded the ball through to Onur Durgan at the edge of the penalty box. His curling shot took a slight deflection off Murphy before it found the net. (Whether or not his shot would have beaten Dale Neal or Alex Moga is a moot point. Matt Wharton did everybody a favour by volunteering to keep goal in the absence of a regular keeper.) About five minutes later, Wharton’s goal-kick was uncharacteristically short and, unluckily, came straight to Onur Durgan who controlled and shot quickly. 0-3! With the game seemingly beyond City’s reach the Lions begin to defend and soak up the pressure and see the match out. A moment of madness from Jan Meidinger cost the Lions a defender. Swearing aggressively at the referee for a questionable decision over a corner kick, there was no question of a card. Was it going to be yellow or red? When the referee was finally given enough room by Lions players to take out a card, sure enough it was red. At this juncture City saw fit to switch to an attacking 3-5-2 formation with Alex Ramirez replacing Mamadi Colley.
City refusing to accept defeat began to apply the pressure. The Lions obviously thought differently, though, because they took off their best player and concentrated on defence. As a result, City soon had the Lions on the back foot.
Still, the Lions didn’t look like conceding. The Lions keeper, Rob Fowler, held on to most of the City shots on target, and the Lions defenders put enough pressure on the City forwards to make shooting difficult. There was plenty of pressure but nothing to show for it until Alex Ramirez tried to cross the ball on the volley, but hit it higher and closer towards the goal than intended. The ball took one bounce in the no man’s land between the defenders and the keeper and then bounced higher than Fowler, expected – over his head and into the net. Now it was 1-3.
A quick check with the linesman confirmed there was twenty minutes remaining. Clearly unnerved, the Lions decided to camp in their own half. Newly encouraged, City pressed forward. With attacks down the flanks, City looked to get the ball behind the Lions defence. (Some of the central City players were even complaining they were not getting enough of the ball at this point.) Finally, a move involving Yunusa, Ebrima and Reymond finished with Dawda in space just inside the box. Dawda swung his right foot in a smooth arc to bend the ball past the flailing arms of Fowler, the Lions keeper, into the bottom-left corner of the net. 2-3.
There were only about fifteen minutes of the game remaining now, so how would the teams play out the game? The Lions had dug in their heels and now they had no choice, really, but to try and weather the pressure. But how much did City have left? Too much, in the end. Yunusa and Reymond were now running the show on the right flank, and Phillips and Cartee were almost equally superior on the left. A driving run down the right beating three players and a perfect pass from Reymond made it easy for Christie to finish from six yards. 3-3!
“How long?” was the question. “Eight minutes,” was the answer. Now feeling utterly deflated, the Lions did not know how to respond. With just a few minutes left, a quick pass from Cartee gave Ramirez the chance to flight a lovely cross to Calvert, who calmly swiveled and flicked the ball home. It happened so quickly nobody had time to enjoy it. 4-3. And, after a couple of minutes of keep ball, that was that. City Get the Last Laugh.
Taipei City 4, The Red Lions 3
Murphy Brace, City Bend But Don't Break
Time: 3pm, January 31st, 2010
Venue: Bai Ling Bridge Riverside Park
By Ed Cartee
The win streak is still intact as Taipei City make a run for the BML title, despite City not being their usual selves on this day. The weather was decently hot, especially in contrast to the cooler temperatures in recent weeks, and many of City’s players weren’t totally fresh since they had already played a full game earlier in the day for their CPL teams. Furthermore, one of those CPL games was significantly delayed due to a severe injury to our own Alex Daly (whom we wish the best for a speedy recovery), so a few City players wouldn’t be able to arrive until the game was already underway. With injuries and absences already having depleted City’s gameday roster, this meant that City would begin the game with only 10 men, including Ross who suited up despite being injured just to provide another warm body on the pitch for City at the start. With Dale Neal in goal, at first the lineup was 4-4-1: John Phillips and Matt Wharton in the center of the defense, Alex Ramirez at left back, Spencer Pangborn at right back, Ed Cartee at holding mid, Ebrima Njie in the center, Steve Reymond at left mid, Niklas Denser at right mid, and Ross Conlon up top. After a while Tim Murphy and Mamadi Colley arrived, and City reshuffled the lineup to have Murphy sweeping, Phillips in front of him, Colley at left back, Wharton at right back, at holding mid, Ebrima still in the center, Cartee at right mid, Reymond at left mid, and Denser and Ramirez as forwards.
The first half was mostly played in City’s own half of the field. The Shin Kong boys applied a lot of pressure high up the field, and City struggled to find an outlet pass and advance the ball with possession. Later in the half, City did manage a couple dangerous sequences: one time Ramirez put Denser through down the right flank leading to a cross; and another time Cartee ran at the Shin Kong back line and pushed the ball past his defender just before being tackled, and the referee gave advantage as Denser ran onto the ball and slotted it near post, but then the linesman judged him offside so the goal was called back. However, these chances were against the run of play. Shin Kong dominated the first half, City were defending the majority of the time, and only some Shin Kong miscues and great City stops especially by the keeper Neal, kept the score 0-0 at the half.
At half-time Conlon exhorted the team to put the first 45 minutes behind us and concentrate on winning the second 45 and salvaging a result out of the game despite the poor performance thus far. City managed to do just that, aided greatly by the arrival of Dawda fatty who made a big difference being a target and holding the ball up for City. Although Shin Kong certainly kept City honest, the second half was much more even, with City generating more chances than before. City went 1-0 up when Steve served a beautiful corner kick and Tim Murphy powered home a header. It was Murphy again who made the score 2-0 by converting a penalty after a Shin Kong defender pulled a hard-working Denser down in the box. There was action at both ends as City still had plenty of defending to do, but towards the end of the match City finally had a few moments where they managed to tease Shin Kong with a little bit of possession, although City still weren’t controlling the tempo of the game as firmly as they usually do. In the waning moments Cartee and Dawda nearly combined for a third goal off a break, but the Shin Kong goalkeeper came out well to deny the chance, and the final whistle the score remained 2-0.
Overall, City will be glad to get 3 points out of the encounter despite not being on top of their game. There is something to be said for the toughness and character proven by overcoming adversity and gutting out an “ugly win” in a hard game. Nevertheless, this contest didn’t have to be as difficult for City as it turned out to be, and City will be eager to get back to classier footballing ways in their next outing. Shin Kong deserves some credit for posing a stiff challenge; they pressured City aggressively on defense, and their forwards made a lot of slashing diagonal runs which were dangerous as the City defense sometimes was a step slow to track. Having said that, the City defense is to be commended for their dogged attitude: on a day when they had a lot to do, they held. Neal also had a superb game in goal, coming up big on several occasions and keeping the clean sheet with determination. Finally, although recovery runs and defensive hustle don’t make highlight reels, every player on the City roster dug deep and made those unsung plays that enabled the team to survive a tough game. Winning is the bottom line, but City will want to get back in the rhythm of playing well the next time they take the pitch.
Taipei City 2, Shin Kong Mitsukoshi 0