The team news was greeted in the morning with sickness & injuries deterring Derek & Rupeng from taking part respectively. Nevertheless, the remaining personnel were deemed strong enough to give Babas a run for their money. With a duo of Aaron & Tong as the attacking aid to Fatt as the lone striker, Tusser aim to score early goals. Hao was preferred over the reliable Wan who is still recovering from a hamstring strain.
Peng the stand in captain emphasized the importance of attacking down the wings and it certainly paid dividends. A superb volley by Francis was parried away by the keeper, as chases after the rebound, the keeper clumsily bundled Fatt. With no hesitant from the referee as he blew for the spot. It was converted by Peng. A second was added soon afterwards , As Francis found space in the left wing who gave a pass to the unmarked Aaron who slotted home.Tusser was on top of their for the first twenty mins. Babas then nicked one back after successive attacks when the Tusser defense went to sleep. Francis almost restored the 2 goal cushion as he narrowly missed the post with a half volley. Half time 2-1 in favour of Tusser
Tusser hit on the panic button in the second half as they struggled to keep control of the
High balls from the opponent. It always a scratch on the head for any manager to find the correct tactics against these well built opponents. They head the ball well, use their body well & even can sneak your balls away with their long legs. Parity was restored with a well headed goal after a sliced clearance by the Tusser player-manager in the penalty box reached a Babas. On a high after coming back from two goals back, they immediately took the lead after a genuine offside call by the Tusser defense was ignored by the ref. Yet again we have to chase the game with few odd mins left. Our last throw of the dice was to bring in the in- form Koonster who also could not transform his recent good play into goals. The best we could offer to score again was a goal mouth scramble where the Babas keeper made a double saves. I thought a draw would be fair for the way we approach the game.
How ironic that we manage to score 2 goals so early yet we can throw the game away. Ultimately the key point of this defeat was about confidence. Start believing in yourself regardless how big size the opponent can be. Wenjie made important saves & interception in the game who was MOM choice.
