Tiro 2 - 7 Hightech (392037471)

Dark skies made the crowd of 12000 at El Potrero a little nervous, but the rain held off. Kristoffer Tetlie was the appointed referee with assistance provided by Joel Magalhães and Li Teck Choon. A 4-4-2 alignment was the formation of choice for Tiro. They fielded: Branch - Davison, Berrios, Osoria, Gonzalez - Girard, Gaspard, Meroney, Dworaczek - Peacock, Green.

Hightech tactics involved an interesting 2-5-3 combination. The following players had been chosen: Vilalta - Rushing, Gaup - Mcwhorter, Ferreira, Cromwell, Berglund, Sanders - Rubin, Brown, Perucho.

Hightech seemed to prefer attacking in the middle. After 4 minutes, Hightech's A. Perucho made his way through the middle and nonchalantly placed the ball out of the keeper's reach, putting the visitors up 0 - 1. M. Gonzalez couldn't do anything to stop the technically gifted A. Perucho as he dodged past on his way to scoring a wonderful goal for Hightech - 0 - 2! The Hightech players could smell victory in the air. S. Rushing wasn't in a hurry to leave the field as he was substituted for P. Flores after 7 minutes. M. Berglund was the new captain of Hightech - handed the armband by the departing player. Confident in their lead, Hightech's players relaxed and focused more on defending the lead than increasing it. With 18 minutes played, Tiro's well-worked indirect free kick caused havoc in the penalty area, and when the ball eventually fell to K. Osoria he gleefully slotted the ball home to make it 1 - 2. B. Rubin of Hightech took advantage of a mistake on the home side's right after 19 minutes which increased the away team's lead to 1 - 3. J. Gaspard almost reduced the deficit, having drawn the entire left side defence away, but the shot went straight into the arms of the goalkeeper. Some fine movement on the left led to a Hightech goal after 26 minutes, making it 1 - 4. B. Rubin was noted down as the scorer. Halftime score was 1 - 4. Hightech enjoyed most of the ball, as they maintained 54 percent of possession.

With 64 minutes played, Hightech put themselves up 1 - 5 after an attack from the right, caused by a defensive blunder. The scorer was R. Brown. 71 minutes into the game, Hightech worked the left side industriously creating several opportunities to add to their lead, but just couldn't apply the finishing touch. 77 minutes in, Tiro's V. Berrios received a yellow card for going into a challenge studs first. A well placed corner kick from B. Rubin was followed by P. Flores's hard but accurate header. The well executed routine resulted in a goal for Hightech, the score now 1 - 6. The visitors' K. Mcwhorter took advantage of a misunderstanding between the home side's goalie and centre backs 84 minutes into the match. 1 - 7 for Hightech. Tiro's D. Branch left the field after 85 minutes because of a nasty blow to the shin. His replacement was I. Recasens. The home side worked hard to get through the middle and as a result, had a good chance of getting one back as J. Gaspard tried lifting the ball over keeper M. Vilalta. Unfortunately, the ball went just over the bar. Hightech's A. Perucho got himself booked for a foul. E. Ferreira fired a shot from distance after 87 minutes, but the long shot couldn't find the net for Hightech. M. Berglund wanted to play on, but the Hightech coach had other ideas, and he was replaced 89 minutes into the game by R. Maire. The Hightech captaincy was handed to R. Maire. The opposing supporters gave the referee an earful when he only gave H. Meroney from Tiro a yellow card after a mistimed challenge from behind 89 minutes into the game. That was far too lenient! A loud groan was heard from the fans of Hightech, as M. Vilalta left the pitch in too much pain to finish the match. À. Barguño took his place on the field. A. Perucho of Hightech got sent off for kicking the ball after the whistle, a completely uncalled for move, earning him his second yellow card of the game. Tiro refused to be intimidated and, breaking through the middle, I. Green managed to slip the ball home for 2 - 7. Tiro claimed to have seen most of the ball, and the statistics agreed with them - possession being 55 percent.

The most dominating Tiro player was without a doubt H. Meroney. I. Recasens on the other hand, had a terrible day. R. Brown performed admirably for Hightech. À. Barguño turned in a dismal performance, however. The match ends 2 - 7.