Cowboys 4 - 1 Olympic (166753928)

Dark skies made the crowd of 34143 at Nanoscience Arena a little nervous, but the rain held off. Branimir Hunjadi was the appointed referee with assistance provided by Kenneth Opstrup and Noam Dego. Cowboys had chosen a strategic 3-5-2 formation. They fielded: Testi - Farneti, Kaplan, Gama - Kołodziejczuk, Frade, Grebien, Di Salvo, Hartrott - Keltanen, Šulc.

Olympic tactics involved an interesting 3-5-2 combination. They fielded: Robles - Bäckling, Néreau, Couto - Marthaler, Håkansson, Grönby, Mansoor, Diano - Frostensten, Månman.

The wings were the focus of most of Cowboys's attacks today. Cowboys took the lead 4 minutes in, as M. Keltanen broke through on the left and put the 1 - 0 shot just beyond the reach of the outstretched keeper. 6 minutes into the game Olympic's A. Grönby found a gap in the home side's central defence and scored with a fabulous shot, making it 1 - 1. Slack defending gave Cowboys a chance to take the lead with 11 minutes played, but D. Kaplan's cross from the left flank was fumbled in front of the goal and easily dealt with by the opposition. The referee showed Olympic's G. Couto the yellow card after a particularly nasty challenge. 1 - 1 was the halftime score. Neither team was controlling the possession at this point in the match, with the stats showing a 50:50 split.

After several obvious shirt pulling incidents, L. Grebien got himself booked. The manager of Cowboys was not happy. They were singing the praises of A. Hartrott 55 minutes into the match after his speculative chip from the middle of the penalty box found its way over the visitors' keeper to make the score 2 - 1 to Cowboys. After 65 minutes Cowboys's M. Farneti had to be carried off on a stretcher in agony. J. Hugentobler came in to replace him. A magnificent combination in the middle resulted in Cowboys's V. Gama increasing the lead to 3 - 1. Almost all the way down to the corner flag, Cowboys's W. Kołodziejczuk somehow managed to get a perfect pass into the middle, impossible to miss for M. Keltanen, who struck for 4 - 1. By now, the players in Cowboys felt that victory was guaranteed and began to play it safe, focusing on defence and not risking too much going forward. After several obvious shirt pulling incidents, V. Gama got himself booked. The manager of Cowboys was not happy. Olympic claimed to have seen most of the ball, and the statistics agreed with them - possession being 53 percent.

Cowboys's best player was D. Frade. G. Testi on the other hand, had a terrible day. Olympic's top performer was clearly U. Frostensten. E. Diano on the other hand, had a terrible day. The match ends 4 - 1.