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YC&AC, Sunday 20th January,
Perhaps we should just skip past the 1st 40 minutes of this one. It was pretty ugly especially for both sets of defenders who collectively seemed to lack the inclination to deal with any Incoming whether on the ground or in the air. I dont know why. It was bright and the pitch was hard and uneven, but no worse than normal, and the often gusting hilltop winds were mercifully missing.
Still 0-0 at HT but both sets of forwards could surely smell the fear and everybody knew that goals would come. And come they did, 5 in total. The 1st, 4th and 5th to YCAC and the 2nd and 3rd to Hibs. That makes 3-2 to save you a job. A scoreline which seemed about right to me but, to some at least, did not reflect YCACs superiority over the 80 minutes. I put it to those people that you didnt have to spend 80 minutes trying to fend off the Hibs Brazilian strike force. The Bash Brothers we shall call them and 2 less stereotypical Brazilian footballers you couldnt begin to imagine. Andre in particular is very Hackney Marshes, very Alan Shearer. Love it! Me and Kevin Keegan, we Love it!
The reason YCAC won this, I think, anyway, was the performance of the 2 fullbacks, Shoot (on my life) and Kitajima. They completely shut down Tomo et al and had established such a grip by the end that Shoot was seen doing steppovers on one mazy run down the wing late in the game. He will be heavily fined, naturally. With Jay and co struggling manfully to cope with the freakish physicality of Tyson Masar in the centre of the field, the Hibs didnt have the "outs" to build their traditional passing game and ended the afternoon a shadow of their normal selves.
The last 20 or so minutes were gratifying for YCACs old hands in particular, long accused of relying on route 1 football. It was us stringing together passes, getting to the byline, playing 1-2s even in the oppo penalty area and Hibs limited to hit and hope down the middle for the Bash Brothers to chase. They did manfully, incidentally, and were rewarded with a goal each to keep things uncomfortable until the final whistle. After my personal tribulations between the posts over the past 2 weekends it is strictly forbodden to criticise the GK in any way. Lets just say that the 2 goals conceded were as soft as any you will see, even in the TML where good goalies are gold dust.
A word for Joe Takeda who dislocated his shoulder at Hachioji the week previous. That would have to be pretty painful but the poor sod got no sympathy either from Sala or his skipper who shouted at him mercilessly for not keeping up with play as he subsequently tried running the line, gimpy wing and all. Anyway, after spending a fair part of sunday night having it relocated (reset?) in a Tokyo hospital Joe played the 80 minutes against Hibs against medical advice. Its true then, where theres no sense, theres no feeling
Report by Steve Taw
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