Season 90 - Are you ready?

[talisman]

No Cup for Desert Rats FC either, today, but they went down fighting, and only a couple of dodgy penalties really hurt them.

The opposition manager made a formation change just before kickoff, which the Rats Management were just able to counter before the three minute warning, meaning that starting XI Quality was equal. The opposition goalkeeper was taking all the set pieces and it is fervently wished that Nordeus would program the defensive hoof upfield into the empty net to counter this - the Rats had a couple of opportunities to do this during the second-half. The opposition opened the scoring with a direct free-kick from said 'keeper when Michal Kaczmerak transgressed, receiving a yellow card for his trouble and forcing him to walk the tightrope for the rest of the match. Osama Dawood chose the right moment to chalk up his first goal of the season when he went round the 'keeper after a (uncreditied) neat through ball from Kostadin Marinov to level the score. And 1-1 it stayed all through the second half and extra time, so a Penalty shootout followed. Garry Crawford missed and Marinov had his attempt saved before Bismark Carroll saved from his opposite number, but he couldn't repeat the trick with the last two shots, and Desert Rats lost 3-4.

Thanks to the vociferous (but not sexy) support from Bunzo, Niko, madflo, Cloverfield and another friend not on the forum - better luck next time.