Bangkok Casuals League Divisions 1 & 2
Both Pattaya City teams travelled away to Bangkok last Sunday with the first team looking for revenge over French side Les Gaulois who beat City in the first match of the season.
Despite the long layoff over the festive season City were soon in their stride and had a chance early on to open the scoring but with only the keeper to beat new signing Aleksei Ivanov lobbed the ball over the keeper and over the bar.
It wasn’t long before Ivanov was in the action again and after receiving a superb ball from captain Craig Banks he saw his shot rebound off the post with the French keeper well beaten. At the other end of the field, a snap shot by the French was well saved by the City keeper and resulting from that, a good combination of passes by City finally saw Ivanov finish off the move with his shot beating the French keeper to make it 1-0 to City.
The same player again hit the Les Gaulois woodwork and the follow up shot was blocked with the ball running for the French.
Riding their luck, Les Gaulois were awarded a free kick just outside the City area and equalized even though City’s keeper got his hands to the ball but could not stop it from entering the net which tied the score at 1-1.
City bounced straight back however and a passing combination involving four players ended with top scorer earnest Dipita making it 2-1 to the Pattaya team.
City were now on top and Oleg Vorontsov was unlucky on two occasions from scoring as the centers were just out of his reach, however soon after they were awarded a penalty when Tshuma was brought down by the French keeper and Dipita converted to make the half time score 3-1.
Within five minutes of the restart the French had pulled a goal back as the City defense was caught square but City made amends when Craig Banks scored at the other end after intense pressure on the French goal to make it 4-2.
Les Gaulois fought back and scored again late on but it was too near the end of the game to worry the City team who ran out deserved winners 4-3.
The reserves played the in-form and top of the table Titans and were soon a goal down but could have equalized after a City player side footed the ball wide with an open goal at his mercy. Titans continued to pressure the City defense however and had scored three more before the half time whistle.
After the break City took the game to the Titans but the defense was welled drilled and chances were few and in the last twenty minutes Titans scored five more times with City’s Nirut grabbing a late consolation goal to make the final score 9-1 to the Titans.
Both teams Pattaya teams have fixtures back in Bangkok this coming weekend.
