Independent 1 - 5 Tarraco (393964326)

Dark skies made the crowd of 689 at Terra Lliure a little nervous, but the rain held off. Quinto Turella was the appointed referee with assistance provided by Mats Pettersson and Carlos Borgoño. A 3-3-3 alignment was the formation of choice for Independent. The following players took the field: Schibli - Thomsen, den Bogaard, Posern - Tabov, Malmstedt, Aranzábal - De Braekeleer, Cáceres, Mcmillan.

Tarraco had chosen a strategic 2-5-3 formation. Starters: Začs - Peñaherrera, Comber - Sangrador, Witcher, Goszczycki, Ruilópez, Vigerust - Maeso Sánchez, Brusadelli, Torres.

Independent seemed to prefer attacking in the middle. Tarraco tried to focus their attacks down the middle. 0 - 1 was the score with 8 minutes played, after J. Witcher cut through the central defence and chipped home a goal for Tarraco. The visitors added to their lead 29 minutes into the game, after a sensational penalty kick by Tarraco's T. Brusadelli slid just past the home keeper. 0 - 2. At this point, it was obvious that the players of Tarraco lowered the tempo and became more defensively oriented. Independent's R. De Braekeleer found himself alone on the left side 31 minutes into the match and laid down a perfect shot - right into the arms of the keeper! After 39 minutes Independent's L. den Bogaard had to be carried off on a stretcher in agony. V. Scarponi came in to replace him. Tarraco increased their lead after 40 minutes when T. Brusadelli broke through on the right, upping the score to 0 - 3, much to the home crowd's dismay. 41 minutes in, Independent appeared unsure on how to play and their organisation was only passable. 43 minutes into the game a free kick by T. Brusadelli found its way through the home side's poorly assembled defensive formation, making Tarraco's lead 0 - 4. By then T. Brusadelli had scored three goals - a hat trick! It was 0 - 4 at the break. Tarraco claimed to have seen most of the ball, and the statistics agreed with them - possession being 61 percent.

The coach gave his players an extra tactical briefing during the break, and after that Independent had solid organisation. The visitors' F. Maeso Sánchez took advantage of a misunderstanding between the home side's goalie and centre backs 53 minutes into the match. 0 - 5 for Tarraco. Tarraco players heard their coach's words ringing in their ears and steered their wing attacks to the middle instead. F. Maeso Sánchez came close to extending the visitors' lead when he found himself completely unmarked in front of the goal after a pass through the middle. He tried to lift the ball over J. Schibli but overcooked it and hit the bar instead. After 71 minutes Tarraco nearly put themselves up another goal from a penalty taken by T. Brusadelli, but the keeper made an unbelievable save. It took several tries, but Independent managed to break through on the left after 72 minutes, getting the ball to M. Mcmillan who easily reduced the lead to make the score 1 - 5. K. Malmstedt behaved like an inexperienced youth player after 76 minutes as he gave the ball away to Z. Goszczycki. Lucky for him though, there was no goal. 79 minutes into the match, R. Torres came through the middle and almost added to his team's lead, but the shot went wide. Tarraco enjoyed most of the ball, as they maintained 61 percent of possession.

The most dominating Independent player was without a doubt R. De Braekeleer. On the other hand, F. Aranzábal's play was disheartening. Tarraco's best player was T. Brusadelli. M. Sangrador on the other hand, had a terrible day. The match ends 1 - 5.