'Nothing less than a win would do' was the pre-match mentality driven to the players before the game as Sharks hopes to grab at least a playoff slot at the end of the season. Despite taking an early lead thru Chris, the team had to toil hard against a stubborn Lucky Strike's defence before Heng Li made sure of the win with a late strike in the second-half.
The away side had to start with 8 players but they held on before reinforcements came five minutes into the game. However, the inclusion of the rest of the players seemed to caused a bit of re-organisation as Li found Chris with a crisp pass before the latter shrugged off 2 defenders as he slot his fourth goal of the season. While Sharks held a firm grip of the game restricting the opposition to only one opportunity which causes a scare in the Sharks camp, they were unable to find a break-thru as they went into half-time with only Chris goal to show for. Lucky Strike then began the second-half strongly as they went in search for the equaliser but were only denied by poor finishing. As the match went into a lull period, Shahrizan thought the got the all important second goal but it didn't count as the referee whistled for an infrigement by Naoki en-route to goal off his pass. Heng Li however made sure of the win with 8 minutes remaining from 35 yards which he pretty much didn't meant it.
Shortly afterwards, Sharks were down to 10 man with 5 mins remaining as Shahrizan received his marching orders for a second bookable offence. The first yellow card was dished out for not wearing a shin-guards. His second was shortly after receiving the first when he came on the field with his shin-guards. The reason was due to not informing the referee that he's coming on after wearing his shin-guards. Despite being a man down, Sharks held on but it could have been a different story.
The manager said, 'While the first yellow card for not wearing a shin-guards was excusable, the second made no sense. Surely a talking to would have done the trick? It could have caused the Sharks the win if we were only a goal up after the sending-off. Nonetheless, let's hope the team learns from this incident. '
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