In a match played at the rather bumpy pitch at Bedok North Secondary School under an extremely hot weather, ARFC brushed aside a 10-men NFL Div 3 side Summerville FC in front of just 77 fans.
Before the match, ARFC was rocked by the last-minute withdrawal of astute-reading sweeper Elvis and entrepreneur Guoxiong, leaving ARFC with just 10 players. However, last-minute desperation calls by Sebastiano yielded 3 more players.
ARFC’s starting eleven were: Unpredictable Blackburn as keeper, hard-working Tong as sweeper, Towering Toh in his normal stopper position, left-foot wizard Bernard as left-back with guest player tenacious Raymond as right-back. WO Neo started as right-midfield, Sebastiano and guest player Song in the centre and new-recruit Andrew as left-midfield. ARFC scoring legend Haron was partnered by Speedy Hee upfront. 2 more guest players Tino and Dee were the reserves.
ARFC quickly went on the offensive from the start. ARFC scoring legend Haron had 2 wonderful opportunities superbly saved by their hugely-impressive keeper, who also made several more saves from the ARFC warriors.
As a result, the score ended 0-0 at half-time.
In the 2nd-half, Speedy Hee replaced unpredictable Blackburn as keeper with the latter playing at left-midfield; Dee replaced WO Neo at right-mid; with Andrew dropping to left-back and left-foot wizard Bernard replaced.
7 minutes after the re-start, ARFC’s relentless pressure finally paid off. Unpredictable Blackburn released a fantastic ball to Tino who then played a slide-rule pass to ARFC scoring legend in the box. With a great first-touch, ARFC scoring legend Haron thumped home the opening goal to open up the flood-gates, prompting chants of “Haron!! Haron!! Su!! Su!!” round the pitch. 1-0 and this was his 102nd goal for ARFC.
7 minutes later, ARFC scored its 2nd goal. Another clever exchange of passes between the midfielders put Haron through who then returned the compliments to Tino to scored his 2nd ever goal for ARFC. 2-0.
In the 57th min, Sebastiano intercepted a ball and released ARFC scoring legend Haron down the right-side. Haron sprinted through and squared the ball to the lurking Tino to shoot home ARFC’s 3rd goal. By now, the opponents looked deflated and simply wanted the match to end early.
In the 67th min, hard-working Tong’s thunderous headed clearance resulted in the ball landing at unpredictable Blackburn’s feet. He looked up and delivered an exquisite ball to Tino in the box who then unleashed a thunderbolt that gave the keeper, in fact, any keeper in the world, no chance at all. 4-0 and Tino notched his hat-trick for ARFC, thereby joining an elite band of ARFC warriors who had scored hat-tricks in a game.
Still, ARFC was not done yet. In the 77th min, Raymond won the ball at his right-back position and played the ball to Dee. Looking up, Dee sent a ball down to the sprinting WO Neo who brought the ball under control and headed into the penalty box. Ignoring a score of players shouting for the ball in the box, WO Neo let fly a shot that was so powerful that the keeper could not prevent the ball from going in despite having a hand to the ball. 5-0 and this was WO Neo’s 43rd ARFC goal.
Special praises must also be reserved for the 2 keepers, especially Speedy Hee who prevented ARFC from going down with 2 superb saves. Hard-working Tong and Towering Toh also snuffed out any chances that opponents had, with great support from the full-backs.
Speaking to the gathering reporters which also included several scouts from prominent clubs (Liverpool, Barcelona, AC Milan, Lyon and San Paulo) and not-so-prominent clubs (Man Utd, Chelsea, Arsenal, Real Madrid, Inter Milan, Everton and Al-Ittihad), WO Neo was ecstatic with his 43rd goal for ARFC:
“I wanna thank my lovely wife, Yvonne, for her understanding and support for my commitment towards ARFC. I also liked to dedicate the goal to my lovely elder daughter who was jumping up and down after seeing me scored the goal. Thank you all, my lovely women in my family…..”
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