DBFC 6 – 0 J-Leaguers
Saturday 2nd March 2019 at Aberdeen Sports Ground with a 6:30pm kick-off.
DBFC squad: Ricky(GK), Matija, Kai, Alex, Syd, Ade, Danny H, Darius, Marco, Kafi, Jordon (Captain), Long Tim, Matt H, Bryn and Christian.
Scorers: Jordon, Kafi x3, Alex and OG.
This was a big game for DBFC in their push to close-out this season’s league title. J-Leaguers were in 2nd place in the Division 1 league table, 6 points behind DBFC, so a win for J-Leaguers would put them well back to challenge for the title, especially as their goal difference was superior. A win for DBFC would put them 9 points clear with 5 games to go, an almost certainty for the title. The call was for our best players to be available and there was a tremendous response from 21 players being available so manager Morse had to make a cut, which he did to 17 players. However, on the day this was reduced to 15 players after Will got food poisoning in the early afternoon of the match and Enzo got injured in a Friday night match.
J-Leaguers turned up one and half hours before kick-off to carry out a big warm up routine, obviously well up for this big game. Completely the opposite for DBFC, with Morse receiving message after message of players going to be late and from Kafi saying he was lost at the wrong pitch (luckily only 1K away). However, DBFC had enough players there 20 minutes before kick-off for Captain Jordon to run a warm up exercise and Morse to give the team talk. DBFC were starting in their usual 4-4-2 formation.
Straight from the kick-off it was J-Leaguers at 100 mph battering the DBFC defence. DBFC were sitting deep to contain the J-Leaguers assault and DB players worked their hearts out to block and get tackles in. The midfield was overrun with J-leaguer players so Danny H was operating on his own to try and collect any clearance to the middle, also any long clearance to Jordon and Kafi up top was being cut out and coming straight back. A change of formation was needed but as Morse was preparing for this change, DBFC mounted an attack that saw Darius (working his heart out) collect the ball on the right and skin the J-Leaguers left back to get to the by-line and look up to pull a nice pass back out to Jordon just inside the 18 yard box that his first time shot whipped the ball into the corner of the J-leaguers goal. This came against the run of play and J-Leaguers immediately resumed their onslaught at the DBFC goal. Morse decided to leave the team formation at 4-4-2 to see out the half. It was a combination of great defending , keeping, heart and good luck that stopped J-Leaguers getting a goal. One J-leaguer shot hit the inside of the DBFC goal post and rebounded across Ricky’s goal line to safety. DBFC held to go in at half time 1-0 up and their players’ adrenalin was pumping. Matija and Kai at CB, Syd and Alex at LB and RB and Ade at defensive midfield had massive performances but obviously they needed all other DBFC players to come back and help.
This belief of resilience and a clever change of formation to 4-5-1, requiring the wide midfielders to push on attacking, turned the tables completely and J-leaguers were shell shocked. The combination of Matt H and Danny H in centre-mid working to win the ball in front of Ade allowed time with the ball to start threading the ball through the spaces between the J-Leaguers defence for Jordon and Long Tim from the wings and Kafi down the middle to run onto and soon DBFC got their second goal well taken by Kafi.
J-leaguers were now constantly turned back towards their own goal as DBFC pressed for a third. The DBFC defence was now pushing up and Christian, Matija at CB had more time to deal with the long attempted passes from the J-leaguers defence and midfield. Ade was shielded by Matt and Danny and now had the time to look up and spray his accurate passing. This was no easy game as J-Leaguers were fast and fit and battled with some skillful football, but DBFC believed and wanted this game more. Another attack resulted in the J-Leaguers saving from Kafi. The resulting corner was fired in by Jordon and met by the J-Leaguers defender at the near post, challenged by Long Tim, to see his attempted headed clearance shoot into his own goal.
DBFC at 3-0 up saw Syd come off, exhausted after his first game back, following months of rest with slippers and hot chocolate, with Long Tim moving to LB and Marco coming back on at RM. DBFC continued their dominance and the 4th goal wasn’t long in coming and was a cracker by Kafi collecting a great long pass from Ade to drive in from the left and fire a shot across the J-Leaguer keeper. Ten minutes later it was Kafi’s hat-trick when some good passing football across midfield was collected by Marco to slot the ball through into the right of the J-leaguers box that Kafi got to, just ahead of their keeper to toe poke the ball under his dive to roll in at the far post. DBFC were well deserved to be 5-0 up.
With 15 minutes to go, Matija came off and Kai move in to CB and Bryn went on at RB and 5 minutes after that Jordon came off and Alex went back on to take up the usual position for him at CF. This turned out to be an inspired tactic because after 5 minutes of being on Alex got his DBFC debut goal. Kafi came in from the left and instead of passing to Marco in front of goal elected to shoot himself. The J-leaguers’ keeper got down well and saved but the ball bounced up, the keeper retreated to his line and his defenders stared at the ball open mouthed as the ball dropped onto Alex’s thigh and one bounce for him to lift the ball over the advancing keeper into the far corner.
At 6-0 DBFC still pressed and with 5 minutes left Ade came off, Alex dropped back to defensive mid and Jordon came back on up top. Jordon had a couple of his mazy runs into the J-leaguers box to see his shots go just wide on both occasions. However, the league’s top goal scorer couldn’t add to his tally and the match finished 6-0. The score-line may give the impression of an easy game of football but this was far from it. DBFC worked extremely hard through-out this game, even the second half, to earn each goal and stop J-Leaguers scoring. Ricky had a couple of great saves in the second half and the DBFC defence all worked very hard to keep the clean sheet.
MOM: Every one of the DBFC players deserves a shout at this but it was the defensive display in the first half that defined this game and Matija and Ade that ruled the fortress DB. So it is a double award this week.
DOD: Could be a number of players turning up late or not turning up at the Pier bar for Christian’s farewell. In fact Christian himself gets a clear nomination for not turning up to his own farewell. However, the award goes to Kafi for getting lost and leading Ade on a tour of Aberdeen. He did find the field with 15 minutes to change and warm up.
