ARFC lost 2-3 due to poor fitness level

Playing its first night match in 2016, ARFC fell 2-3 to the F Div team. 

Prior to the match, ARFC was hit by late withdrawals of Ismail, Chun Haw and Jinzhong, leaving all ARFC warriors struggling for breath late in the match.

ARFC welcomed back Weilit after his POP. 

ARFC started with this 4-4-2 line-up:

 

Jersey no.	Name	Position
33	Talisman Derrick	Goalkeeper
16	Marauding Guoxiong	Right-back
14	Combative Ron	Sweeper
15	Towering Toh (captain)	Stopper
6	Unbeatable Darren	Left-back
2	Unpredictable Blackburn	Right-mid
4	Dynamic Soon	Centre-mid
28	Hard-man Tjioe	Centre-mid
19	Skillful Weilit	Left-mid
66	Wonder Wayne	Striker
11	Speedy Hee	Striker
Subs:
7	Influential Sebastian
9	ARFC Scoring Legend Haron
Absent:
3	Astute-reading sweeper Elvis
5	Impeccable How Meng
8	Talented Chun Haw
10	Sublime Khim
17	Nippy Kenny
18	Determined Huiming
20	Composed Eng Lai
21	Rampaging Raymond
31	Vintage Chua
45	Commanding Ismail
77	Dependable Jinzhong
78	Steely Tze Ern
99	Powerful Alvin

ARFC took the lead after Sebastian came in to replace Tjioe who has worked his socks off in the opening 20 mins. 

Within 77 seconds of coming on, Sebastian exchanged a series of short passes with Blackburn, Soon and Guoxiong which resulted in the latter swinging in a cross from the right. Wayne ran in from deep and saw his first shot blocked by their GK. However, Wayne followed up to prod the ball home for his 17^th ARFC goal. 1-0

ARFC almost doubled its lead 7 mins later. From a quick corner, Guoxiong again sent in a looping cross into the box. Despite carrying a niggling injury on his left thigh, Haron still leaped the highest to glance the ball goalwards which seemed headed for the bottom left corner. Unfortunately, he was denied by a full-length diving save by their GK. 

ARFC then conceded 2 goals to trail 1-1 at half-time.

ARFC fell further behind after conceding from their counter-attack. 1-3

Derrick also did well to deny the opponents on a couple of occasions. 

Mins from the end, from Sebastian’s corner, the opponents somehow handled the ball under pressure from Wayne.  Regular penalty-taker Sebastian graciously allowed Wayne to take the spot-kick instead. With his recent red-hot form, Wayne could not miss and he duly thumped the ball into the net for his 18^th ARFC goal. 2-3

My personal Man-of-the-Match goes to Darren who found himself handling at least 2 opponents for most of the match as he received very little support from the left midfielders, Weilit and Blackburn. 

Voting results:

Soon – 10

Darren – 8

Wayne – 6

Tjioe – 5

Hee – 3

Ron – 2

Weilit – 1

Sebastian – 1

Guoxiong – 1

Derrick – 1