B Boys bite the bullet of controversial refereeing decision in first loss

6 Feb 2012

 Serangoon Sec 3 - Bowen Sec 0

It was a game the senior Bullets had to win to ensure passage into the quarter-finals of the North Zone B Div Boys Football Tournament, but a harsh sending-off by the man in black has thrown a spanner into the Bullets’ plans. Against Serangoon Sec this afternoon, the Bullets succumbed to a 3-0 loss after Bullets goalkeeper Casimir Ng was sent off in the 28^th minute for an innocuous foul on a Serangoon striker. Being the last line of defence, the referee deemed it a case of preventing a goal scoring opportunity and applied the law of the game to the letter.

 In a tightly contested game, both teams failed to fashion any clear-cut goal scoring opportunities in the first 20 minutes. The Bullets put pressure on their opponents but were also pinned back often in their own half. When they managed to get into the attacking third, the final pass was ably cut off by a well-oiled Serangoon defence.  

Serangoon Sec launched numerous long balls into the heart of the Bullets’ defence and in one of these raids came the moment that changed the whole game. A long pass dropped behind sweeper Muhd Shafiq for Casimir to come and collect but the ball was lose for a while and in that moment, a Serangoon striker pounced on the keeper and tripped over the goalkeeper’s body just inside the penalty box. The referee blew the whistle from the centre circle and rushed in to show Casimir a red card. A second punishment was to follow as Serangoon Sec then converted the penalty awarded to them for the alleged foul.

The Bullets might have felt hard done by the controversial decision that will rule first-choice goalkeeper out of the last 2 matches. Yet, they continued to work hard to get back into the game after midfielder Tan Renyu was replaced by stand-in keeper Muhd Hilman. It was however, never going to be easy. In the 36^th minute, a botched clearance by Muhd Shafiq richocheted into the penalty box, inviting a Serangoon striker to tap the ball into an empty net.

The Bullets continued to press on in the second half, hoping for a comeback but a mix-up in defence from another failed clearance saw the ball trickled beyond Hilman, and into the net. 3-nil down with 10 minutes to go, it was going to be an uphill task. Forward Karthik and Dinesh, right-back Muhd Hakim came on to inject much needed urgency but were in vain.

The loss was a bitter pill to swallow especially when the Bullets were convinced that they could manage a win with 11 vs. 11 on the field. To add insult to injury, right fullback Muhd Akhsan suffered a sprained ankle late in the game and Muhd Azfar collected a yellow card. The Bullets will now have to throw caution to the wind in their next match against Group C favourite Marsiling Sec this Thursday or their dream of achieving a top-4 position in the competition will go up in smoke.

Man-of-the-Match: Muhd Azfar for exhibiting the type of fighting spirit worthy of a team leader. Even when the chips are down, he continued to chase and challenge for every ball.

Line-up: Casimir (sent-off, 28^th min), Shafiq, Royce, Hanafi, Akhsan (Hakim), Ali, Royzat, Renyu (Hilman), Azfar, Prem (Dinesh), Arsyad (Karthik)