Dragon Open 0:0 Rusty Nuts

---Written By Huan Li

We did not get 3 points for securing the playoff spot,
but we were not too disappointed about the game result
though. It was a very close game. Either team can win
the game by cashing in one score chance.

We may feel lucky to get 1 point back and put both
Rusty Nuts and Real San Luis below us now. Rusty Nuts
has a lots of young legs and plays very physically.
They hasseled everywhere, but played quite clean. They
pass the ball well and know how to utilize the field
width, especially two sides in the middle field. They
got more ball possession time and made more (4-5)
shots on the goal. The most dangerous shot is the one
that hit the post. It was my bad to allow their player
to penetrate in front of the penalty box after lost my
position, when trying to make myself open for a
throw-in on the right side of the middle field. DaGang
tried to fill up my position but it made the left side
wide open. They made a successful quick
counter-attack. Fortunately, the shot was blocked by
the right post. They also managed to sent the ball
into the net with an indirect free kick. Fortunately
John was unable to touch the ball and the referee made
the right call. Now we understand why this team can
get 4 points from Peru-Dallas.

We may also feel unlucky for not getting the whole 3
points. Before the game, we guess Rusty Nuts is a
physical team and will have advantage on the airy
ball. We made right adjustment for our lineups and our
defense was quite soild. Although they crossed
numerous high balls (including a lots of long
throw-ins) into our penalty box, none of them created
real threat to our goal. On the offense side, the
midfielders did good job and organized many
counter-attacks. Li Wei used his dribbling skill to
get rid of his marker twice inside of the penalty box
in the first half, unfortunately both shots went too
high. Their defender almost headed one of Li Wei's
cross into their net, if their goalie did not respond
so quickly and hit the ball out near the post. Li Wei
also had a chance to head the ball into the empty goal
under the pressure from their defender, while their
goalie lost his position in the second half. However,
the ball went over the bar. Xu Zhu got our best score
chance in this game. He made an excellent blind-side
run and the ball was successfully passed from the
middle field to the left upper cornner of their
penalty box. It would be a perfect 1-on-1 chance but
Xu Zhe failed to receive the ball. Overall, we used
right tactics against this team and the game was well
played. I was a little disappointed that we did not
take full advantage when one of their player got
ejected from the field in the last 3-5 minutes though.
I know our adjustment of the lineups affected some of
player's play time. I appologize since I did not
communicate well before this critical game.

Inter-Peru tied their game with Sideburns. The chance
for them to make into playoff becomes minimum. The
follwoings are the standings for the five potential
candidates: Irving Arsenal (21 points); Dragon (12);
Real San Luis (12); Peru-Dallas (10 after 6 games);
Rusty Nuts (9). There are up to three games to go:

Dragon: vs Irving Arsenal (2); vs Real San Luis (1)
Real San Luis: vs Peru-Dallas (2); vs Dragon (1)
Peru-Dallas: vs Real San Luis (2); Irving Arsenal (1)
Rusty Nuts: vs Inter-Peru (2); vs Sideburns (1)

We have no control on Rusty Nuts. I only hope
Inter-Peru will get as much points as possible from
Rusty Nuts. We need to win a game to secure a playoff
game. The best case is that Real San Luis lost both
games to Peru-Dallas and we only to get one point from
them to become #4. Of course, weather may change the
situation. We need to get at least 1 point from the
games against Irving Arsenal to keep everything under
our control. Otherwise, our only hope might be to beat
Real San Luis in the last makeup game.

I got more sleeping after filed the Tax retrun and
look forward to the game this weekend. Hope you are
ready too.

Go Dragons,

Li Huan