Ardenis 7 - 2 PharmaFC (368494894)

Overcast weather free of rain made for a crowd turnout of 30298 at Palota-stadion today. Cosmin Stãnculescu was the appointed referee with assistance provided by Phillip Püntener and Juha-Matti Fagerlund. Ardenis decided to use a 2-5-3 set up. They fielded: Zdziarski - Marongiu, Kakko - Olmedo, Kaser, Surace, Leblond, Jurubeba - Moskov, Yankov, Kromhout.

PharmaFC started off with a 5-4-1 lineup. The following players had been chosen: Mehlretter - Siegrist, Jónás, Borges, MacGoun, Spruner - Gustavsson, Heilesen, Ramstad, Mizura - Torkaman.

PharmaFC clearly had decided to counter-attack when they could. C. Kromhout gave Ardenis the lead as he successfully challenged the guests' central defenders, then slotted the ball into the bottom corner, giving the keeper no chance. 1 - 0 The referee was not popular with the home supporters after he awarded PharmaFC a controversial penalty after 22 minutes. R. MacGoun made no mistake, levelling the score at 1 - 1. Ardenis took the lead 24 minutes in, as C. Kromhout broke through on the left and put the 2 - 1 shot just beyond the reach of the outstretched keeper. The home side's A. Moskov came close to extending the lead 26 minutes into the game. His shot came in from the right hand side but L. Mehlretter managed to save it with an unbelievable reaction stop. After 33 minutes, the visitors levelled the scores after A. Mizura made it through the middle and struck home to make it 2 - 2. 2 - 2 was the score after the first half. Possession in the forty-five minutes was dominated by Ardenis, with 69 percent of the ball.

In a rapid move 53 minutes into the match, A. Moskov of Ardenis lost his man and passed the ball to the unmarked C. Kromhout who easily hit it home to make it 3 - 2. Luckily the ref didn't see him taunting the opposing fans in celebration - naughty boy! That was his third goal of the match - a hat trick for C. Kromhout. Ardenis put themselves up 4 - 2 when A. Moskov broke through on the right, leaving the entire defence trailing in his wake. As the game started to slip away for PharmaFC, the manager decided to change the tactical approach. F. Olmedo unleashed a swerving effort from the right that the visitors' keeper did well to tip wide. After 64 minutes PharmaFC tried to exploit their counterattacking skills, unfortunately, P. Siegrist's shot sailed wide after his break down the right. M. Spruner was ever so close to scoring after an excellent corner was beautifully flicked on by K. Jónás, but the ball bounced off the post to safety. 72 minutes into the match, the visitors' central line of defence had to look on as L. Kaser broke through, making the score 5 - 2 for Ardenis. V. Yankov had a fantastic opportunity to put Ardenis up another goal 76 minutes into the match, but he fired just over the crossbar. C. Kromhout should probably have put his team up another goal after 79 minutes, but some great goalkeeping by L. Mehlretter kept the visitors in the game. T. Jurubeba's early cross saw the defenders caught out of position and the alert C. Kromhout was able to pounce and roll the ball past the hapless goalkeeper to score for Ardenis. 6 - 2. The players of Ardenis now seemed to think the job was done and acted more defensively, just waiting for the ref to blow the final whistle. After 86 minutes, the away team failed to deal with a good exchange of passes on the right, and V. Yankov gave the Ardenis supporters even more to cheer about when he increased the lead to 7 - 2. Possession in this half belonged to Ardenis, who controlled the ball 71 percent of the time.

The most dominating Ardenis player was without a doubt C. Kromhout. On the other hand, M. Marongiu's play was disheartening. Most important PharmaFC player was C. Heilesen. K. Jónás turned in a dismal performance, however. The match ends 7 - 2.