fanta_dattilo 5 - 4 SPAL (381845623)

It was an exceptionally sunny day for the crowd of 15408 that came out to fanta_dattilo Arena. Erik Scheiber was the appointed referee with assistance provided by Krzysztof Szawara and Rafael Lacomba. fanta_dattilo started off with a 2-5-3 lineup. Lineup: Evert - Piatko, MacGinnis - Couperus, Wunsch, Frőhlich, Godet, Meriruoko - Ostovarzadeh, Elia, Martínez Salas.

SPAL decided to use a 3-5-2 set up. They fielded: Weiss - Navarrete, Coelho, Sakup - Grande, Oskarsson, Farkas, Cordero, Sáenz Camacho - Lenza, Meilink.

fanta_dattilo seemed to prefer attacking in the middle. P. Ostovarzadeh caused the crowd to go mental with his goal up the middle after 2 minutes. This gave fanta_dattilo the 1 - 0 lead. fanta_dattilo players heard their coach's words ringing in their ears and steered their wing attacks to the middle instead. Cheers filled the stadium as S. Martínez Salas broke through the visitors' central defence to put away the ball to increase the lead to 2 - 0 to fanta_dattilo. The players of fanta_dattilo now seemed to think the job was done and acted more defensively, just waiting for the ref to blow the final whistle. The away team improved the scoreline to 2 - 1, as S. Meilink struck home, set up well by a play on the left 7 minutes into the match. Some brilliant football from the visitors' right wing resulted in a levelling of the score as SPAL's L. Sáenz Camacho put the ball in the onion bag after 13 minutes to make it 2 - 2. They were singing the praises of A. Elia 18 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 3 - 2 to fanta_dattilo. The teams went for the halftime break at 3 - 2. fanta_dattilo enjoyed most of the ball, as they maintained 53 percent of possession.

Although the whole team were struggling to impress, SPAL's M. Lenza was singled out as being the problem as he was called off the pitch after 46 minutes. C. Pérez was given a chance to change things around. 48 minutes into the game, fanta_dattilo had difficulty finding their positions and their organisation dropped to weak. 49 minutes into the match, the visitors' central line of defence had to look on as V. Piatko broke through, making the score 4 - 2 for fanta_dattilo. The home crowd was silenced as L. Sáenz Camacho took a successful penalty shot 51 minutes into the game, reducing the home lead to 4 - 3. With 58 minutes played, the visitors could have drawn level after L. Sáenz Camacho came through the middle, but his kick went wide. 66 minutes into the game, fanta_dattilo's A. Elia surprised the visitors with a raking cross-field pass to P. Ostovarzadeh who easily found the back of the net, making the score 5 - 3. L. Sáenz Camacho wasn't much help defensively. His energy-consuming forward runs proved quite costly in the oppressive heat. 77 minutes in, an amazing pass from the left side resulted in a goal for the visitors, as S. Meilink anticipated the through ball and scored, reducing the deficit to 5 - 4. SPAL had most of the ball, with 56 percent of possession.

fanta_dattilo's best player was S. Martínez Salas. G. Evert was a disappointment, however. The most dominating SPAL player was without a doubt D. Farkas. B. Grande on the other hand, had a terrible day. The match ends 5 - 4.