It was a great weekend for relegation threatened San Pellegrino’s as they moved level on points with Corinthians, and just three adrift of Krauts after gaining a narrow success over the a Cors team slipping closer and closer to Division Two. Manjeet was desperately seeking new additions to his squad during the week, but the result was just not successful enough in the transfer market. San P’s were grateful to James Redmayne for his excellent goal after nice build up play from Andy Shiu in particular, however they had to see the game out with ten men as the goal scorer would later get his marching orders for a second yellow card.
Forward’s relentless march towards the title shows no sign of stopping, with Goodfellas on the receiving end of a 5-1 hiding. Forward’s boss thought it was a comfortable match, suggesting the Fellas would only threaten occasionally on the counter attack. Fellas however were less than pleased with the officiating, feeling that Forward got a soft penalty, a foul in the build up to the fourth goal while having a goal wrongly ruled out themselves. A Kafi Harun brace, with further goals from Habib Spiller, Jose Lorenzo and Silvio Ruprah did the damage.
USRC continued their fine run of recent form on Friday night with another victory, this time putting Tropics to the sword by three goals to one in a hard fought encounter. The Gunners went ahead after a lovely move saw Mark Jobling round the goalkeeper to open the scoring. Further chances came and went as USRC stayed on the attack, and eventually Jaime Hooper would add a second with a low left footed strike from twenty yards; if only the celebration matched the quality of the goal. Tropics however came out fighting second half, and found their way back into the game with a lovely Michael Gee goal. USRC however never really looked like conceding a second, with veteran Steve Cairns pulling the strings in the middle of the park. A second Mark Jobling goal, this time a sublime lob with the last kick of the game sealed the points for USRC.
Elsewhere, a ding-dong affair between Stags and Spartans saw the HK Scottish boys come out on top by the odd goal in seven. James Hill scored twice, while Adam Pursani and Simon Lowth bagged a goal apiece in what was a really great game and a solid advert for legal league football. Despite losing, Sparts manager Stef Kelly was proud of his team’s performance, especially given the number of players missing for one reason or another. HK Stags stay third, three points behind DB in second with a game in hand in what has been a remarkable first season in the top flight thus far.
J-Leaguers gave DBFC another blow to their fading hopes of catching Forward, beating them 2-0 with goals from Yasumasa Miyauchi and Yuji Hiarno in a largely uneventful game. Not helped by a red card, DBFC could only muster one shot on target and Dave Rollinson was honest enough to say that his side were simply terrible on the day.
The remaining fixture saw Mes and Krauts battle out a 2-2 draw, which could be a vital point for both sides come the end of the season. Krauts hotshot Bastian Braun took the lead from the spot, but Omer Keita equalized after a nice run. Krauts thought they had won all three points late on with a superb strike from twenty five yards from Juni Holstein, however, Mes caught the German defence napping and Will Harvey was able to snatch a late point.
In the Second Division Soho Spartans continued their rich vein of form with a convincing 6 - 2 win against Vikings at Po Tsui Park. The two top goal scorers for the division where on display with Li Yongsen drawing closer to Lars Nelsens at the summit with his four goals to Lars double. Rainhard Kreindl and newbie Chris Corcoran also added to the Vikings woes who showed spirit throughout the game but were unable to match it with their opponents who are now placed second in the table.
Revolutions Chris Marshall hat trick was enough to give them a 4-2 victory over Team Shotgun at Kowloon Tsai Park. Revolution went 1 nil up as Dave Brown turned in a well struck free kick, Revolution had a few chances to extend their lead before having to soak up a lot of pressure themselves as Shotgun tried to find a way around their stubborn defence. After the break Revolution welcomed the return of their top goal scorer Chris Marshall who through some perseverance managed to break free of the defence and put his team 2 nil up in second half. Shotgun got a goal back soon after from Tim Leung which lifted their team spirits and it became a very open game. Much to Revolutions relief they managed to re-establish the 2 goal cushion when Marshall getting his second goal from a quality Jessop header. Shotgun’s Derek Huang got a goal back as Revolution lost the ball to their left winger and a neat move saw Shotgun get back into the game at 3-2. With 10 minutes to go Revo managed to get some breathing space as Chris Marshall completed his hat-trick as Jason Edwards delivered a great ball from the right.
On the Monday night lower Kings Park pitch Bants continued their pursuit for a division title with a 3-1 victory over a youthful KCC Cavaliers. Bants took a 3-0 lead at halftime from Sam Ameen, Chee Wong and Lee Hodgeson goals. Second half saw lots of action as first Bants man Futao Lu was sent off for two yellow cards. Cavs then pull one back from Ryan Jarvis goal. In the dying moments of the game controversy as Bants make a substitution that goes wrong. One man came off and mistakenly two entered the pitch in his place. The high intensity of the match at this point meant that neither the Bants management, referees nor Cavs realised it until maybe 20 or 30 seconds later, within one passage of play. As soon as the mistake was spotted Bants subbed their extra player and was booked by the official. “I think both the teams had a very solid game yesterday, both teams played with very high intensity only to be halted by the incident late in the game” said Cavailers manager player Javeed Mohamed.
In the other Monday Night blockbuster at Kings Park KCC Royals scored a slim 1-0 victory over Samurai Blue curtsey of another Paul McGunnigle goal. Couldn’t be more unlucky, we hit the woodwork 3 times and 2 goals disallowed said Samuari Blue manager Kais Khadhroui.
In Division Three Young Guns continue their quest to win the division with a 7-0 shellacking of BOCs and open up a 5 point lead at summit. A double from Lam Sai Hai and goals from Justin Wong, David Tse, Garry Yu, Albert tong and Cheng Ming set the tone for the match which BOCs had no reply to.
Legal Head also gave Shui Wei FC a football lesson with a 7-2 drubbing. Legal Head broke the deadlock first and scored steadily throughout the game from Charles Reid, Josh Mak, Amin Ashraf, Brian Chu, Limbu Versaj, Gurung Misal and Tom Walton.
Shui Wei played to the end with a couple of well taken goals from William Ferdinand and Lee chi keung “Leo”. In the end the extra subs against Shui Wei bare 11 made the difference to cover our injuries and the first hot day of the year said Legal Head manager Doug Simmons.
TWF lost ground to the leaders when they were smashed 5-0 by Old Speckled Men. Both Amro Abbas and Arun Makija scored a brace each while Oscar Pointon also got on the scoresheet at Aberdeen Sports Ground.
The Shooters distance themselves from the bottom two teams as the also pounded MBFC 5-0 at Tin Yip Park. Junpei Sato, Hiroshi Uehara, Takayoshi Ono, Kazuhisa Takeda and Momotarou Sakamoto all got on the scoresheet. A delighted Shooter manager Toshiyuki Nishi spoke after the game “Thanks to wonderful, superb pitch, we managed to win, great game with fair play to guys from MBFC”.
