The Qantas Young Socceroos have been held to a scoreless draw by Singapore in their third match of the AFC U-22 Championship Qualifiers in Pekanbaru, Indonesia.
The Qantas Young Socceroos have been held to a scoreless draw by Singapore in their third match of the AFC U-22 Championship Qualifiers in Pekanbaru, Indonesia.
Again Qantas Young Socceroos head coach Paul Okon made a number of changes to the starting line-up to rest his players due to the grueling schedule of 5 matches in 11 days.
The first half was a dour struggle played in hot and overcast conditions. Singapore played very deep and made it difficult for the Qantas Young Socceroos to create any meaningful scoring opportunities.
Just before half-time, the Qantas Young Socceroos were dealt a significant blow when captain Terry Antonis was sent off in dubious circumstances.
Antonis seemed to be pushed by a Singaporean player, but the referee was on opposite side of the pitch, and didn-t see the incident but turned around and sent the Australian off for no discernible reason.
With a man down going into the break, Paul Okon was forced to reshuffle his formation making two changes at half-time with Jake Barker-Daish and Reece Caira replaced by Nick Fitzgerald and Yianni Perkatis.
The second half saw the game start to open up and Fitzgerald immediately made an impact creating attacking runs and scoring opportunities.
The Qantas Young Socceroos dominated the majority of proceedings, but were unable to get a clear shot on goal due to the stoic Singaporean defence.
With three minute remaining in regulation time, Singaporean substitute Muhammad Farhan Bin Rahmat was sent off for a late tackle on Fitzgerald.
From then on the Singaporean players tried to delay the game which prompted the Bahraini referee to signal six minutes of additional time.
With the player numbers back to being equal, the Qantas Young Socceroos made a final push to pressure the opposition, but again were unable to find a goal.
Okon was frustrated by the manner in which the match was played but focused on the challenge of the next match against Timor Leste.
“As expected again we came up against a team that only had the intention to sit deep and limit any possible scoring opportunities from us,” said Okon.
“On a bumpy pitch it was difficult to play the type of football we wanted to and it was disappointing to lose Terry Antonis, which made the task even harder.
“We now turn our attention to the next match, our goal coming here was to qualify for the finals of this competition and we are working hard to achieve that,” concluded Okon.
In the other matches host nation Indonesia defeated Macau 2-1 and Japan narrowly defeated Timor Leste 1-0.
The Qantas Young Socceroos will meet Timor Leste on Thursday, 12 July with their final match against Japan on Sunday, 15 July.
The top two teams from Group E and the best third placed team of all groups will then progress to the AFC U-22 Championships, which will be played in January 2014.
Match Details Qantas Young Socceroos 0 Singapore 0 Kaharudin Nasution Stadium, Penkabaru, Indonesia Tuesday 10 July 2012 Referee: Salah Mohamed Noor Shaikh ABBAS ALABBASI (BAHRAIN) Assistant Referees: Sayed Jalal Mahfoodh ALAWI MOHAMED (BAHRAIN) & Abu Bakar Salim MAHAD AL-AMRI (OMAN) Fourth Official: Tan HAI (CHINA P.R.) Crowd: 1,378 Temperature: 31 deg C (Cloudy)
Qantas Young Socceroos line-up: 12.Aaron LENNOX (gk), 2.Josh BRILLANTE, 3.Connor CHAPMAN, 5.Corey BROWN, 6.Reece CAIRA (23.Yianni PERKATIS 46-), 8.Jake BARKER-DAISH (15.Nicholas FITZGERALD 46-), 10.Terry ANTONIS (c), 11.Jesse MAKAROUNAS, 14.Anthony PROIA, 16.Giancarlo GALLIFUOCO, 42.Ben GARUCCIO (43.Luke O-DEA 83-).
Substitutes not used: 13.Daniel PETKOVSKI, 17.Mitch COOPER, 18.Nick MUNRO (gk), 19.Jason GERIA, 20.James DONACHIE, 21.Brandon O-NEILL, 30.Jack DUNCAN (gk), 39.David VRANKOVIC, 41.Riley WOODCOCK,
Yellow Cards: Corey Brown 18-, Anthony Proia 57-, Ben Garuccio 89-
Red Cards: Terry Antonis 42-.
Singapore Line-Up: 24.Muhammad Syazwan BIN BUHARI (gk), 2.Muhammad Al-Qaasimy BIN ABDUL RAHMAN (C), 4.Delwinder SINGH , 5.Ali Hudzaifi BIN MOHD YUSOF, 10.Muhammad Faris BIN RAMLI, 11.Ignatius Ang YU HENG (6.Madhu M MOHANA 72-), 12.Shamil SHARIF, 13.Muhammed Aqhari BIN ABDULLAH, 15.Sheikh Abdul Hadi BIN SH OTHMAN, 23.Teo Wei Jin Basil GERARD (, 20.Muhammad Farhan BIN RAHMAT 78-), 46.Ahmad Suhaimi Bin MOHAMED YASIN (27.Amy Recha PRISTIFANA 53-)
Substitutes Not Used: 1.Muhammad Neezam BIN ABDUL AZIZ (Gk), 7.Sufianto BIN SALLEh, 8.Samuel Benjamin S/O NADARAJAH, 9.Safirul BIN SULAIMAN, 18.Loo Zhan QUAN GARY, 30.Al-Faiz ISHAK (Gk).
Yellow Cards: Ali Hudzaifi Bin Mohd Yusof 47-
Red Cards: Muhammad Farhan BIN RAHMAT 87-