DBFC 45s 0-2 Fai Yeung
Saturday 3 September at South China Athletic Association, K.O 2pm
Squad: Newley/ Pedro, Martin, Steve/ Morse, OB, Simon, Baz, Nik, Shyne/ Hymsey.
Initial subs: Resco, Rob, Adam, Fela, Kieran C.
Our stop-start 2021-2022 season started again on Saturday with a friendly against the ex (and in many cases current) pros of Fai Yeung who overwhelmed us in our previous encounter in June. This time we came better prepared with a stronger and bigger squad. Manager Steve had been googling “strategies for containment” and decided to pack the central defence and midfield, with us operating much of the time as a 3-6-1. Our plan to relieve the pressure by hitting it into the channels backfired hours before KO with Fouad calling in sick, so we opted for the wisdom and smarts of Hymsey up front. We started off confidently with an overload in midfield and plenty of possession out wide with Morse and Shyne operating as wing backs. Martin at CB soon became our main outlet for converting defence into attack with his huge crossfield right to left passes behind their RB. However, Fai Yeung were controlling most of the possession and operating in our half. We looked more composed out of possession and they did not seriously threaten for the first 25 minutes. However they then took the lead when we lost the ball moving forward on the right and their LW got in behind and crossed to the near post – their extremely youthful CF connected first time on the half volley and gave Newley no chance. We managed to get all our subs on this point and to our credit we kept them out until H-T. 2nd half was more of the same but we were perhaps inevitably a bit more disjointed in the third quarter. Newley kept us in it with some very decent saves. At this stage Fela was making his comeback after a 12 months absence, Resco and KC operating as wing backs and a centre MF of OB, Rob, Adam and Simon. We started to run out of legs a bit with Simon disappearing for a refereeing engagement, Resco picking up an injury and Martin taking a well earned break to save himself for a Sunday game. We went 2-0 down after some loose possession just outside our area, which gave their striker a fairly straightforward finish, but otherwise we kept going until the very welcome final whistle. A solid performance by everyone against a very decent opposition in difficult conditions.
