Dan is the Man
No one had seen Francesco, Federico S, Diego and Jonathan for days. After the first two phenomenal goals from set pieces by the Colours everyone realised they must have been practising set pieces 24/7 since they were last spotted.
The opener was a beauty: Francesco from the corner spot sent in a ball with a lot of pace which evaded the Orange defence while meeting above the clouds Federico’s head to terminate its bullet voyage right under the bar. Simply astonishing.
Mark Hateley, author of a famous similar winning goal in the Milan v Inter derby in 1984 soon after watching Federico’s goal exclaimed: ‘This is me again. In fairness I had an easier job as I was contending with Collovati while here Federico had to deal with Hannes’.
Goal number two started again from a corner kick this time taken by Diego and finalised by an impeccable volley by Jonathan into the second post.
In both cases the ball after the initial kick only touched the ground after hitting the net: to do this serially the way it was done it requires supreme skills, space awareness and spotless timing. All qualities fans are very familiar with but to be able to showcase them with such grace and abundance was something that had the crowd standing in raucous ovations.
Talking of which, some of the attendance, especially the elderly one, have made the conscious decision to restrict themselves to two or maximum three standing ovations per game as jumping up and down all the time throughout the match was taking its toll on their health.
The Orange were baffled by the sudden turn of events, made worse by the lack of a role goalkeeper, but were quick to rationalise it: they had that far the better chances and only the combination of same profligacy upfront and Tony’s superb saves had preserved the clean sheet.
At one point a close range shot by the Orange looked like a sure goal: a very good keeper could have dived close to it. Perhaps a Buffon, Casillas or Neuer could have put their fingers to it but none could have done what Tony did: he activated the spring under his boots, jumped to the ball, harpooned it locking it with both hands and rolled with it on the ground few times. When he stood up his smile betrayed a confident message: ‘anything less than this don’t even bother’.
There was in fact a golden opportunity for the Orange: Giancarlo’s shot was deflected by Hossam’s hand resulting in a penalty. The Italian was only eager to follow up his theory that new wider goals and shorter distance by applying scientific criteria would has meant overall higher penalty conversion, so far at a dismal 32% according to internal figures provided by the data team.
It did not go according to plan and Tony’s intervention was not even required as the ball went agonisingly wide. Giancarlo took it in his chin and moved on: this time Michael Jordan mantra ‘ I missed 100% of the shots I didn’t take’ was not 100% fitting…
Orange badly needed to twist tactics a bit: you could hardly think of a more dangerous attack with four lethal strikers like Zaid, Daoud, Giacomo and Nizard but snipers need ammunitions which somehow midfield was not able to provide with regularity, not least because of the formidable opposition provided by Dan, Branko e Bijan fighting every single ball.
Daoud therefore started playing behind the strikers linking up more effectively with Johannes and Giancarlo. The new strategy paid instant dividend and Ziad halved the gap at 2-1 giving the Orange renewed hope.
There was though a new enemy: the clock ticking against the Orange into the golden goal time. There are very few players who can decide when and how to score: Johannes has proven many times to be one of those. He took the ball, danced with it to his comfort left zone and unleashed a penetrating low shot that went through many legs ending its course at the bottom of the net to provide a perfect 2-2 golden goal finale.
It fell again on the player who restored hope to ratify glory for the Orange with a beautiful shot or rare precision and power that sent the ball touching both sides of the top corner, arguably beyond the line. The VAR incorporated in the new purpose-designed goal sent in no time the key images on the bar clearing any doubt.
The Orange hell to heaven voyage was completed in style with the players soaking in the jubilant crowd ecstatic at another nail biting performance before their eyes. Comeback players like Piero and Branko were particularly required for selfies as fans missed them for too long.
What is most pleasing about turning up on a Saturday is that you are almost guaranteed to see new faces and new talents. Today was no exception. We had Ken from France and Dan from Algeria (not a new Nation, dammit). Ken fought valiantly in the Orange defence and was also able to come forward with accurate passes. Dan on the opposite side was an absolute force showing perhaps the best combination of pace and skills allowing him to be never dispossessed regardless the number of enemies surrounding him and being the reference point for his teammates.
It is rare for a Rookie to be elected Man of the Match and even rarer to be so when belonging to the losing side. And today there were deserving candidates like Ziad, Johannes and Bijan but Dan won by a margin. Curiously most of the votes were accompanied by the comment ‘Dan is the man’. Perhaps not the most creative one but surely an unequivocal endorsement.
ORANGE-COLOURS 3-2
GOALS
ORANGE: Ziad (2), JohanneS
COLOURS: Federico S, Jonathan
TEAMS
ORANGE: Hannes, Chetan, Thomas, Piero, Ken, Giancarlo, Johannes, Victor D, Daoud, Giacomo, Ziad, Nizard
COLOURS: Tony, Hossam, Riccardo, Branko, Federico S, Andre’, Dan, Andrea M, Bijan, Sara, Diego, Jonathan, Francesco, Arman
by Giancarlo Castelli