Españoles 1 - 5 Tottenham (389965577)

The crowd of 12000 turning up at Taylor Eduardo Larrañaga Diez today were greeted with some nasty showers of rain. Johan Harder was the appointed referee with assistance provided by Jonny Thomasson and Erni Scherzinger. Españoles tactics involved an interesting 3-4-3 combination. They fielded: Pompeyo - Pennisi, Ragusa, Jansson - Ambros, Rajkochevski, Peni, Kažić - López, Ackaert, Bazamani.

Tottenham decided to use a 3-5-2 set up. The following players took the field: Falkér - Pomatta, Capela, Pukallus - Jarić, Curucheta, Baptist, van Wessel, Thiện Tâm - González, González.

Españoles used their ability to concentrate their attacks in the middle of the pitch, rather than on the wings. Tottenham took a creative approach on the field. A. Kažić caused the crowd to go mental with his goal up the middle after 12 minutes. This gave Españoles the 1 - 0 lead. A really bad tackle inside the penalty area 34 minutes into the match gave the referee no other choice but to award the visiting Tottenham a penalty. J. Curucheta knocked it home. 1 - 1 After 35 minutes, Tottenham put themselves up 1 - 2, as J. Capela finished off a strike from the left with a real cannonball of a shot. 38 minutes into the match, the visitors put themselves ahead 1 - 3 as O. González finished off an attack from the left with a spectacular scissors kick. It was a bad day for the usually speedy A. Kažić. The mud seemed to slow him down. A drive down the left side allowed J. Curucheta to get in close and score another goal for Tottenham after 40 minutes, taking the score to 1 - 4. Confident in their lead, Tottenham's players relaxed and focused more on defending the lead than increasing it. Halftime score was 1 - 4. Tottenham claimed to have seen most of the ball, and the statistics agreed with them - possession being 62 percent.

J. Pompeyo got a fingertip on B. Thiện Tâm's shot from the left 66 minutes in, and managed to keep the visitors from going up another goal. With 67 minutes gone, F. Ackaert suddenly found himself completely free on the right wing when a counterattack by Españoles caught their opponents by surprise. Only a great save by the opposing keeper prevented him from scoring. J. Curucheta had a hard time on the waterlogged pitch - his trademark technique was nowhere in sight today. With 75 minutes played, F. Ackaert was very close to reducing the score for Españoles with a low drive from the left, but a defender stuck his foot out just in the nick of time, blocking the shot to a corner. Some fine movement on the left led to a Tottenham goal after 76 minutes, making it 1 - 5. J. Curucheta was noted down as the scorer. That was his third goal of the match - a hat trick for J. Curucheta. Tottenham enjoyed most of the ball, as they maintained 64 percent of possession.

F. Ackaert performed admirably for Españoles. R. Ambros was a disappointment, however. The most dominating Tottenham player was without a doubt H. van Wessel. On the other hand, G. González's play was disheartening. The match ends 1 - 5.