Spider 5 - 2 Kandava (381505146)

The weather was pretty good, and a crowd of 55277 had shown up at Black Spider United Arena for the match. Mateusz Parapura was the appointed referee with assistance provided by Florian Döbel and Don Phipps. A 3-5-2 alignment was the formation of choice for Spider. Lineup: Barrantes - Onisko, Dikel, Zagarskikh - Gomide, Streltsov, Boghe, Cadieux, Adamiak - Pielau, Omino.

Kandava decided to use a 3-5-2 set up. The following players took the field: de Lara - Almukhametov, Bustamante, Mikhaylov - Mimidis, Skaists, Raiss, Zawada, Šmits - Kuzyk, Rakshin.

The goal for 1 - 0 was a funny story: after 13 minutes the seemingly nonchalant lob from Spider's G. Omino landed at the feet of B. Pielau who sidefooted it into the net - nice goal! Spider's L. Adamiak set up a perfect opportunity for B. Pielau, but the latter failed to score. Spider's V. Streltsov increased the lead to 2 - 0, after he saw his shot go between the legs of the advancing goalkeeper following some good play down the right wing after 23 minutes. Kandava's P. Mimidis was shown a yellow card for standing over the ball and blocking an opponent's quick free kick after 24 minutes. M. Bustamante showed why he is feared on the counterattack, breaking through in the middle and scoring for Kandava after 27 minutes to make the score 2 - 1. L. Adamiak unleashed a swerving effort from the right that the visitors' keeper did well to tip wide. 35 minutes into the game Kandava's M. Bustamante found a gap in the home side's central defence and scored with a fabulous shot, making it 2 - 2. Spider's G. Omino tried to break through in the middle repeatedly, but couldn't get past the visitors' defenders. 2 - 2 was the halftime score. Spider enjoyed most of the ball, as they maintained 54 percent of possession.

The visitors' central defence should have had no trouble clearing the pass to B. Pielau, but the Spider player managed to shrug them off and fired a low shot past the keeper to give his team the lead. 3 - 2! Kandava needed a fresh pair of legs on the field, and after 66 minutes V. Almukhametov made way for B. Le Roux. A speedy charge from the left side of the field increased the lead of Spider to 4 - 2 as J. Boghe finished it off competently, firing in from an acute angle. Unhappy with the result so far in the game, the Kandava manager used a brief break in play after 77 minutes to give the players new directives. G. Omino had a fantastic opportunity to put Spider up another goal 77 minutes into the match, but he fired just over the crossbar. Things were going to get worse for the visitors. G. Omino squirmed through their central defence after 86 minutes, increasing the lead to 5 - 2. Spider claimed to have seen most of the ball, and the statistics agreed with them - possession being 57 percent.

Spider's best player was B. Pielau. However, N. Gomide made a disastrous appearance. B. Le Roux performed admirably for Kandava. V. Šmits was a disappointment, however. The match ends 5 - 2.