Sports 0 - 5 Zhai (393417461)

The 12000 fans in attendance at National Stadium were roasting in the hot sun. Beat Casutt was the appointed referee with assistance provided by Ivan Berny and Lasse Persson. A 5-4-1 alignment was the formation of choice for Sports. Lineup: Yousif - El-Talib, Gallelli, El-Ismail, Fahmi, Shareef - Bari, Ehegartner, Vaičiulevičius, Khudria - Carlsson.

Zhai tactics involved an interesting 3-4-3 combination. The following players took the field: Abdel Hamid - Bin-Ibraheem, Bauder, Ibn-Gibril - Gromann, Rojec, Scailquin, Zhilenkov - Sæter, Vikesh, Soffientini.

For their match strategy, Sports had decided to use their ability to counter-attack whenever possible. After 2 minutes, the Zhai coach had a quick word about the tactical set-up and decided to try another approach. Zhai took the lead 2 minutes into the game, making the score 0 - 1 after some elegant movement down the middle. A. Ibn-Gibril was the scorer. The visitors' S. Sæter took advantage of a misunderstanding between the home side's goalie and centre backs 11 minutes into the match. 0 - 2 for Zhai. S. Sæter received a delicate pass through the home side's central defence after 34 minutes, and chipped it past the flailing keeper to score making it 0 - 3. The Zhai fans went wild, whilst the home fans started to think about leaving early. Z. El-Ismail received some harsh words from his coach after he acted foolishly 37 minutes into the match, probably out of lack of experience, and almost let an opponent score. Halftime score was 0 - 3. Possession in the forty-five minutes was dominated by Zhai, with 75 percent of the ball.

After 48 minutes, an incisive pass through the middle gave G. Bauder a chance to increase the lead for Zhai, and he did not disappoint. The score was then 0 - 4. The players of Zhai now seemed to think the job was done and acted more defensively, just waiting for the ref to blow the final whistle. Sports needed a fresh pair of legs on the field, and after 55 minutes N. Yousif made way for M. Akbaşak. After 59 minutes, Zhai sent a free kick in high over the penalty box. In what looked like a well-rehearsed move, the ball was headed backwards and reached A. Bin-Ibraheem, who had plenty of space to place a well aimed shot - 0 - 5. Although the whole team were struggling to impress, Sports's B. Vaičiulevičius was singled out as being the problem as he was called off the pitch after 60 minutes. J. Göransson was given a chance to change things around. As the captain was no longer on the pitch, M. Carlsson took over the role of being the Sports captain. Usually a powerful player on the field, N. Zhilenkov looked kind of pale and tired under the hot sun. A. Fahmi found it hard to catch his breath today in the stifling heat. Sports's defence sent a ball soaring up the middle on a beautiful counterattack with 79 minutes gone, but A. Fahmi's finish was met by the reaching hands of the keeper. With the scoreboard showing that 84 minutes had been played, Zhai nearly put themselves up another goal after G. Soffientini came through on the left. Fortunately for the home crowd, the keeper made the save. Zhai claimed to have seen most of the ball, and the statistics agreed with them - possession being 70 percent.

J. Göransson performed admirably for Sports. However, M. Akbaşak made a disastrous appearance. The most dominating Zhai player was without a doubt G. Soffientini. M. Gromann was a disappointment, however. The match ends 0 - 5.