jappies 3 - 2 Holcim (388491709)

The crowd of 54976 turning up at Budweiser stadium today were greeted with some nasty showers of rain. Elliot Dehlbeck was the appointed referee with assistance provided by Ulli Karanitsch and Rainer Knapp. A 3-5-2 alignment was the formation of choice for jappies. The following players had been chosen: Mertens - Wickby, Wełnic, Ribeiro - Fiacre, Werrion, Claus, Clauw, Lehner - Keymis, Meermans.

Holcim tactics involved an interesting 3-5-2 combination. Starters: Lemos Costa - Janhsens, Kristensen, Miestauskas - Supper, Kokkalidis, Discart, Macher, Strømberg - Hassel, Hekim.

It was an obvious ambition of Holcim to use their ability at attacking on the flanks. It was a bad day for the usually speedy R. Wickby. The mud seemed to slow him down. At 7 minutes played, R. Wickby came in from the right with the intention of giving jappies the lead, but his rocket of a shot rattled the crossbar. Holcim's M. Discart was shown a yellow card for standing over the ball and blocking an opponent's quick free kick after 16 minutes. 30 minutes into the game, V. Miestauskas almost gave the visitors the lead, as he clipped a delicate lob over the keeper, but the ball glanced harmlessly off the crossbar. J. Meermans caused the crowd to go mental with his goal up the middle after 31 minutes. This gave jappies the 1 - 0 lead. jappies increased the lead as É. Lehner struck to make the score 2 - 0 after an attack from the left left him unmarked in front of the keeper. Cheers filled the stadium as J. Meermans broke through the visitors' central defence to put away the ball to increase the lead to 3 - 0 to jappies. The players of jappies now seemed to think the job was done and acted more defensively, just waiting for the ref to blow the final whistle. 3 - 0 was the halftime score. Holcim claimed to have seen most of the ball, and the statistics agreed with them - possession being 55 percent.

Players in Holcim heard their coach's words ringing in their ears and steered their central attacks to the wings instead. The visitors' right side was dangerous today; Ç. Hekim made the home team's keeper look foolish as he easily reduced the lead to make it 3 - 1 47 minutes into the match. With 54 minutes played, the Holcim coach decided a substitution may help turn the game around. D. Gosnet came on, J. Janhsens had to leave the fray. Ç. Hekim had a hard time on the waterlogged pitch - his trademark technique was nowhere in sight today. T. Keymis could have put jappies up one more, but he fired into the side netting after breaking free on the left after 73 minutes. The opposing supporters gave the referee an earful when he only gave É. Lehner from jappies a yellow card after a mistimed challenge from behind 87 minutes into the game. That was far too lenient! There was concern in the stands when, at the 89 minute mark, jappies's D. Claus hit the ground hard, but he refused the attention of the trainer and rejoined his teammates on the pitch. The visitors got one back when N. Hassel finished off a pass from the left and scored after 89 minutes. 3 - 2 was the score. Possession in the forty-five minutes was dominated by Holcim, with 57 percent of the ball.

jappies's best player was T. Keymis. However, R. Ribeiro made a disastrous appearance. N. Hassel performed admirably for Holcim. I. Strømberg was a disappointment, however. The match ends 3 - 2.