Isomatic 5 - 1 Soldiers (390068955)

Dark skies made the crowd of 38636 at Isomatic Ltd Arena a little nervous, but the rain held off. Aris Toulikas was the appointed referee with assistance provided by Andrejs Pavlovs and Dean Harrison. Isomatic had chosen a strategic 3-5-2 formation. The following players had been chosen: 智誠 (Zhicheng) - Saurín-de la Torre, Gogoşoiu, Tadić - Eberstein, Stuart, Bond, Kletten, Allsopp - Refalo, Bouville.

Soldiers decided to use a 3-4-3 set up. Lineup: Young - Otero, Ankum, Vigani - Domizio, Penha Filho, Perini, Popescu - de Slager, Kleinlauth, Alexandrov.

After 18 minutes C. Popescu made a speedy advance and dropped the ball to M. Kleinlauth who shuffled it past the keeper. The score was now 0 - 1. Isomatic's K. Refalo put his head to a well placed ball, lifted in from the left, and scored to make the score 1 - 1 with 21 minutes showing on the scoreboard clock. Isomatic's R. Bond refused to leave the field after injuring his achilles tendon after 27 minutes. Isomatic broke through on the left 28 minutes into the game, with M. Bouville firing in from an acute angle to give the home side a 2 - 1 lead. Isomatic's K. Refalo increased the lead to 3 - 1, after he saw his shot go between the legs of the advancing goalkeeper following some good play down the right wing after 31 minutes. After 32 minutes, D. Allsopp put Isomatic ahead 4 - 1 when he rose to head in a cross from the right wing. The players of Isomatic now seemed to think the job was done and acted more defensively, just waiting for the ref to blow the final whistle. The crowd gasped as C. Popescu of Soldiers was flattened by an opponent after 34 minutes and had to be carried off. F. Leemann came in off the bench. Halftime score was 4 - 1. Isomatic claimed to have seen most of the ball, and the statistics agreed with them - possession being 76 percent.

A magnificent combination in the middle resulted in Isomatic's L. Eberstein increasing the lead to 5 - 1. N. Stuart should probably have put his team up another goal after 62 minutes, but some great goalkeeping by S. Young kept the visitors in the game. Isomatic enjoyed most of the ball, as they maintained 72 percent of possession.

K. Refalo performed admirably for Isomatic. A. Kletten was a disappointment, however. Soldiers's best player was A. de Slager. On the other hand, F. Leemann's play was disheartening. The match ends 5 - 1.