The difficult art of scoring from your half

The game started balanced and remained so for few minutes but progressively the Orange superior organisation made all the difference.

The unquestionable defence solidity granted by Alessandro’s safe pair of hands and the ever reliable and dynamic pair made by Bijan and Hossam, allowed the midfielders’ diamond (Julien, Jonathan, Yussen, Yassin) to adopt a forward traction finding in Giancarlo, operating as a ‘falso nueve’, a partner for fast one-two propelling the attacking players in front of Paride.

The resulting reward was Yassin and a rejuvenated Jonathan, fully recovered after injury, sharing a hat-trick each with Yussen adding a brace to close the day with a tally of eight goals for the Orange.

Colours did their best to counter and Daoud did what he does best, to score a brace but the team was torn by internal disagreement about the tactics to adopt and today with such an opposition is was a dangerous luxury to concede.

There was a turning point that made everyone understand that the match was heading the Orange way: their defence was preparing to face yet another Colours’ corner with the antiaircraft on red alert as Paride, fast as an arrow, was crossing the pitch to put his lethal aerial skills at the disposals of the squad

Somehow the incoming ball met the Orange resistance and Yuness picked it up just outside the box with Paride rushing back to cover his unguarded distant goal. Yuness calmly raised his head, scientifically assessing all the relevant variables (distance, wind, ground elasticity,  ball’s pressure and weight etc) to unleash a poisonous shot which flew undisturbed over enemy lines to softly find its ultimate place inside the lonely net.

For those in the knowledge, flashes of similar shots by likes of Beckham, Xabi Alonso, Rooney, Stankovic, Scholes quickly came to mind. With one difference: normal football goals are 7.32×2.44mt while FDs ones measure only 5.64×1.98mt. As the distance was similar, to compare Yuness ballistic achievement with the others does not make our Morocco player any justice.

A goal like that could have killed any team but, to their credit, the Colours, while accepting defeat with an adverse 8-3 score, composed themselves for the ever important golden goal and with a well orchestrated move were able to put Francesco in front of Orange goal for a clinical conversion amounting to a brace for the day.

Yuness goal was the highlight of the game, in itself worth the attribution of the Man of the Match award but unfortunately for him the GOAT was back to his prime today eradicating balls in his own defence and then then asking himself: ‘do I dribble my solo way to goal or do I involve my mates?’  As Yassin is a kind man he often went for option two to delight the crowd with team moves also finalised by others.

At the end of the match Giancarlo went to Yuness to congratulate him for an excellent game but also to tell him off for not passing the ball every time the Italian shouted ‘Youssef pass the ball!’ Yuness reply was disarming ‘my name is Yuness, not Youssef’. That’s one of the risks of operating a global business with new participants joining every week from every corner of the world.

Talking of which today we welcomed Nadir, a friend of Yuness, who brings beautiful Uzbekistan as the 73rd Nation. And counting.

ORANGE-COLOURS 8-4

GOALS
ORANGE: Yassin (3), Jonathan (3), Yuness (2)
COLOURS: Francesco (2), Daoud (2)

TEAMS
ORANGE: Alessandro, Hossam, Julien, Bijan, Jonathan, Yassin, Yussen,  Giancarlo
COLOURS: Paride, Riccardo, Federico T, Diego F, Andrea M, Nadir, Daoud, Francesco