Darren key to ARFC's 2-1 victory

 Dishing out a dominant display, ARFC somehow only managed to carve out a narrow 2-1 win over another ‘No Name’ team 2-1 on 22 Oct 2023 at 3 pm at Compassvale Sec Sch.

 

ARFC took to the pitch with this 4-4-2 line-up:

 

Jersey No.:	Name	Position
29	Flying Fremont	Goalkeeper
66	Vintage Chua	Right back
3	Astute-reading sweeper Elvis	Sweeper
15	Towering Toh	Stopper
6	Unbeatable Darren	Left back
16	Marauding Guoxiong	Right mid
7	Influential Sebastian (captain)	Centre Mid
4	Dynamic Soon	Centre Mid
10	Sublime Khim	Left Mid
23	Talented Chun Haw	Striker
99	Powerful Alvin	Striker
Substitutes:
14	Combative Ron
20	Composed Eng Lai
28	Hard-man Tjioe
78	Steely Tze Ern
xx	Divine Delon
xx	Rio (guest player)
xx	Rio’s friend (guest player)
Missing In Action:
1	Agile Zhi Chong
2	Remarkable Rashid
5	Energetic Kerwin
9	ARFC Scoring Legend Haron
11	Speedy Hee
13	Talisman Derrick
17	Nippy Kenny
18	Determined Huiming
19	Skillful Wei Lit
26	Rampaging Raymond
27	Left-foot wizard Kejendran (KJ)
31	Wonder Wayne
77	Dependable Jinzhong
98	Impeccable How Meng

 

 

ARFC received a huge blow barely 3 mins into the match. 

 

Alvin, who was suffering from a dead leg while playing for another team last week, had a recurrence of the same injury and had to limp out. Delon took his place upfront to partner Chun Haw.

 

ARFC dd not let the setback pull it down and in fact created 4 glorious opportunities but were all spurned by Chun Haw.

 

The opponents then took the lead with their first attack in the game. 0-1 now.

 

Chun Haw was then fouled about 30 metres from goal.  Sebastian lined up but his fiercely-struck curling free-kick bounced off the cross-bar. Unlucky!

 

Tze Ern and Tjioe then came on and combined to almost equalised for ARFC.

 

Tjioe, who has been colossal in recent matches for ARFC, floated in a delightful through pass to the right.  Tze Ern sprinted in from deep and hit a thunderous right foot volley but the ball just missed the far post by 0.77 mm!  Unfortunate but what a pass from Tjioe and shot from Tze Ern!

 

Fremont then showed his incredible reflexes when he made a brilliant low dive to this left to keep out a certain goal.  Fantastic save!

 

Half time 0-1.

 

ARFC did not panic and finally found its equaliser 3 mins from the re-start.

 

Both Chun Haw and Delon combined to press their defender into losing the ball and Chun Haw fully capitalised by slotting the ball past their GK for his 113^th ARFC goal. 1-1 now.

 

7 mins later, came the move of the match. Chun Haw pinged a long diagonal ball from right to the left for Khim.  Bringing down the ball expertly which is to be expected given Khim’s calibre, Khim easily beat their right back and cut the ball back to the area outside the penalty box.  From deep, Tjioe latched onto the ball and rocketed in a rising shot (ala Paul Scholes) that had goal screaming all the way until their GK somehow managed to palm the ball over for a corner!  

 

Brilliant move that did not reap dividends!

 

ARFC continued its relentless pressing and was eventually rewarded with the match-winning goal.  Again, both Delon and Chun Haw pressed their left back whose hooking clearance went horribly wrong as it sailed over his own GK for an own goal.

 

2-1 now and this was the 43^rd own goals conceded by ARFC’s opponents since Jun 1991 when ARFC was formed.

 

ARFC then had Fremont to thank when he produced a world-class reflex save at the death to give ARFC Open Team its 8^th victory in 12 matches in 2023.