In a match played on Deepavali Day, ARFC returned to its winning ways with a thrilling 4-3 victory over DARTS at ITE Balestier in front of 7,777. The low crowd was due to the Deepavali as our Hindu fans were not available. However, sublime Khim's family, Brenda and Dylan, determined Huiming's wife, YanXiu, influential Sebastiano's newly-minted wife, Caren, astute-reading sweeper Elvis' and hard-running Guoxiong's girlfriends, Anna and Tracie respectively, were present to lend their important morale and physical support to ARFC.
In fact, the festive occasion also hit ARFC as Kiat Gulam did not turn up as promised due to his heavy binge at a Serangoon Road pub with his business associates. He was later found by police lying on all fours by the Police at Veerasamy Road in the wee hours.
ARFC was further hit by the late withdrawal of hard-man Tjioe who was down with a flu. Fortunately, ARFC was able to enlist the assistance of both Kaixiang (Rendezvous FC defensive midfielder) and Edwin, a highly-rated defender/midfielder from the now-defunct Kampong Boys. Hard-running Guoxiong also forsake his $777-a-day earnings by closing his highly-successful mobile shop just to play in this match.
ARFC started with dependable Jinzhong in goal with astute-reading sweeper Elvis marshaliing the defence of determined Huiming, hard-working Tong and left-foot wizard Bernard. Hard-running Guoxiong was the right midfield and talisman Derrick started on the left, with influential Sebastiano and Kaixiang holding the central midfield. Powerful Alvin and Speedy Hee led the forward. Sublime Khim, unpredictable Blackburn and Edwin were the subs.
ARFC was determined to shrug aside their 4-1 debacle in theie previous match. Hence, when the match started, ARFC immediately gave their all and wanted to prove to the fans that last week's showing was just an "one-off". Indeed, ARFC had a couple of excellent chances but squandered off away.
Disaster struck in the 17th min. Hard-running Guoxiong lost the ball to the opponent who then broke our off-side trap to put them 1-0 up. Immediately after the goal, hard-running Guoxiong was replaced by sublime Khim and talisman Derrick switched to the right-side.
Not surprisingly, sublime Khim's entrance galvanised ARFC. Just minutes of his entrance, he delivered a Glenn-Hoddle-like through ball to talisman Derrick who then faced their keeper one-on-one. To the horror of the whole stadium, he shot meekly and weekly to their keeper.
Talisman Derrick, however, soon redeemed himself. Sublime Khim won the ball in midfield and sent in a cross to talisman Derrick who tried to flick the ball but their defender handled the ball, giving the referee no option but to point to the spot. Up-stepped powerful Alvin but his kick was saved by their keeper. Fortunately, powerul Alvin reacted the fastest and prodded the ball home for the equaliser and his 32nd ARFC goal.
Determined then saved ARFC with a world-class block on the line. Dependable Jinzhong also pulled off another great save, while our forwards continued to squander away some good chances. The first-half ended 1-1.
Edwin replaced Kaixing in the second half. 7 minutes after the re-start, influential Sebastiano sent the ball down the right flank to unpredictable Blackburn. Spotting their keeper off his line, he displayed superb technique and power by leashing the ball home from the right flank and the ball hit the net before anyone in the stadium knew what was happening. According to the subs sitting just nearby, the ball's trajectory did not move a bit even though it travelled at almost 177 km per hour. World-class and this was his 63rd ARFC goal, closing in on deadly Robin's 69 goals for the team.
However, the opponents equalised in a most comical manner. In his attempt to clear the ball, left-foot wizard Bernard inexplicably diverted the ball to their off-side striker ala Ronaldinho. Of course, the striker took up his invitation and duly tucked the ball home for their equalsier. 2-2 now.
ARFC did not give up. In the 67th min, Edwin, who was hugely impressive, won a header and the ball rolled to influential Sebastiano while sublime Khim continued his run. Influential Sebastiano took a touch and played a slide-rule pass to sublime KHim who then side-footed the ball home for his 27th ARFC goal.
The opponents equalised again through a header after some sloppy work by our left-hand side defence in the 77th min.
ARFC, however, had the final say in the match in the dying minutes. Again, sublime KHim won the ball and delivered a world-class diagonal ball to the lurking Speedy Hee on the right. Spotting their keeper off position, Speedy Hee expertly curled in the ball for the winning goal and his 48th ARFC goal, sparking 7 rounds of chants of "Hee! Hee!Hee!" from the fans.
The score-line was a fair result as ARFC was clearly the deserving winners. Though guilty of squandering many great chances, ARFC was much indebted to Dependable Jinzhong for pulling off at least 2 world-class saves to keep ARFC in the match.
Speaking to the Super Imports Night (SIN) car models after the match, Man-of-the-Match sublime Khim (not for the first time) thanked the fans for showing up on a holiday to support the team. He also thanked Brenda and Dylan for coming "Looking back, it seems that I would usually score whenever Brenda and Dylan are around."
When the SIN models tried to ask for his number to ask him out, sublime Khim politely turned them down by saying "Sorry, you girls may be sexy, but I think Brenda is way much better than all of you." Sublime Khim immediately left the interview room with Brenda and Dylan in tow, ignoring the black faces of the SIN models.
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