Bucaneers 4 - 0 Harvard (365910716)

Overcast weather free of rain made for a crowd turnout of 38650 at Red Bull Arena today. Leo Koskelainen was the appointed referee with assistance provided by Stefan Engström and Wilfried Köhler. Bucaneers tactics involved an interesting 3-5-2 combination. Lineup: Liendo - Lhota, Prampero, Ebarhimi - Tarsi, Kraus, Keczeli, Hadraba, Hnát - Gökdeniz, Eulen.

Harvard started off with a 3-5-2 lineup. The following players had been chosen: Lovětínský - Suhonen, Rohrbach, Krobot - Küçükbilezikçi, Mertz, Martínez Delgado, Brönimann, Ménard - Tsiolas, Bamberg.

The wings were the focus of most of Bucaneers's attacks today. The referee signaled a penalty for the home side after 13 minutes, amid vocal protests from the visitors. Bucaneers fans erupted in celebration as K. Gökdeniz rifled the ball into the the top corner. 1 - 0! With 21 minutes played, Bucaneers's Y. Tarsi almost extended the lead, but his shot from the left glanced off the top of the bar to fall behind the net. 1 - 0 was the score after the first half. Possession in this half belonged to Bucaneers, who controlled the ball 60 percent of the time.

A great save by keeper L. Lovětínský after 47 minutes kept the visitors in the game after M. Prampero struck from the left with a real cannonball. Cheers filled the stadium as S. Kraus broke through the visitors' central defence to put away the ball to increase the lead to 2 - 0 to Bucaneers. Bucaneers put themselves up 3 - 0 when M. Prampero broke through on the right, leaving the entire defence trailing in his wake. After this, you could see that the players of Bucaneers were more interested in killing time than scoring more goals. Content with how the game was proceeding, the Bucaneers coach let S. Statham replace J. Hadraba after 65 minutes. Y. Tarsi wanted to play on, but the Bucaneers coach had other ideas, and he was replaced 70 minutes into the game by M. Surma. The coach of Bucaneers was happy with the game so far, but still wanted to change the line up. After 70 minutes, R. Vandeput came on for K. Gökdeniz. Harvard certainly deserved a goal after some stunning play down the left, but M. Brönimann just wasn't able to finish. Harvard's M. Küçükbilezikçi got himself booked for a foul. After 82 minutes, the away team failed to deal with a good exchange of passes on the right, and S. Kraus gave the Bucaneers supporters even more to cheer about when he increased the lead to 4 - 0. Possession in the forty-five minutes was dominated by Bucaneers, with 63 percent of the ball.

A. Eulen performed admirably for Bucaneers. R. Vandeput was a disappointment, however. Most important Harvard player was J. Suhonen. However, F. Ménard made a disastrous appearance. The match ends 4 - 0.