Playing a friendly match under scorching weather on Saturday against a Vietnamese team, ARFC strolled to an easy 3-0 victory in front of just 7,777 fans including Anna (wife of Elvis), Irene (girlfriend of Alvin) and finally Caren (wife of Sebastian) who made her long-waited appearance after many many months away. With the victory, ARFC did what our Singapore Lions could not do by beating Vietnamese opponents. Lu Ma!!
The reason for the low turn-out was because the other fanatical fans were at Clarke Quay area to support the Best Football Club in the world Liverpool FC.
Prior to the match, ARFC received a huge blow when Hardman Tjioe had to pull out as he performed too many “wheel-barrow” antics on Friday night and sprained his back. Medical examinations revealed that Tjioe had to do without sex for the next 7 months.
ARFC started with this line-up:
Keeper: Dependable Jinzhong
Right-back: Hard-running Guoxiong
Sweeper: Uncompromising Edwin
Stopper: Towering Toh
Left-back: Astute-reading sweeper Elvis
Right-mid: Dynamic Soon
Centre-mid: Influential Sebastian
Centre-mid: Hardworking Tong (captain)
Left-mid: Speedy Hee
Striker: Unpredictable Blackburn
Striker: Powerful Alvin
Subs:
Combative Ron (late)
ARFC Scoring Legend Haron (late)
Andrew (guest player)
Even though ARFC was in “holiday mood” due to its Annual Awards Night later in the evening, it still wasted no time in imposing its authority in the match. The match was just 7 mins old when Guoxiong embarked on his trade-mark over-lapping run down the right flank and chipped in a world-class cross ala David Beckham. The ball sailed over all their defenders and goalkeeper and Alvin has the simplest of task in simply nodding the ball home for his landmark 100th ARFC goal!! With this goal, Alvin joined Haron as the other centurion goal scorer for ARFC!!! Upon seeing Alvin chalked up this milestone, Irene was seen performing her own Mexican waves by herself 77 times at the side-line.
Perhaps still in celebratory mood, ARFC turned complacency and was nearly punished in the 27th min when Edwin was robbed of possession and the ball was squared across to their unmarked striker who looked certain to score from just 7 metres out. Incredibly, Guoxiong came from nowhere to nick the ball away ala Jamie Carragher for a corner. Superb defending!!
The Vietnamese opponents then resorted to some rough-house tactics and fouled every warrior on almost every challenge. Their bold moves were encouraged by the very-inept referee who incredibly tolerated all their challenges!!
In the 2nd half, ARFC continued its poor display and craved out few chances. Nevertheless, ARFC doubled its lead in the 67th courtesy of yet another delicious cross from Guoxiong. The ball found the head of Edwin who had moved up to the striker role and he made full use of his height to head the ball past their despairing keeper for his 6th ARFC goal. 2-0.
Just 7 mins from the end, Haron chipped in a fabulous cross from the centre to Edwin whose bullet header was spilled by their keeper. Edwin followed up with a pressure to the keeper who tried his best to retrieve the lose ball and the loose ball eventually fall to Haron at the goal-line and Haron gleefully thumped the ball home from 0.7 metres out for his also land-mark 150th ARFC goal. 3-0!!
Man of the Match must be given to Guoxiong for his 2 assists as well as his wonderful and determined defending which reminded everybody of a certain Rob Jones from the great Liverpool side in the early 90s.
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