Grigamandala wins, national team still in turmoil
Good evening I’m James Adderly and you’re strapped in for another ride on Sports Monday. After four straight wins in the current BFL playoffs undefeated Grigamandala took its unblemished record into the Norman Broaster Stadium against a re-surging Real Verdes, knowing full well it wasn’t going to be an easy task to pick up the W.
Dangriga usually gets off fast, but today it’s Real Verdes with the first real scoring opportunity, when Raimundo Flores bends this spotkick around forcing Stanley Reneau to come up with a big time save early. This long kick from Peter Mariano provides an opportunity for Malakai Nolberto to move the scoreboard, but he couldn’t hit the target with the flick.
Again it’s the home team pressing for goal and Albert Vasquez does come up with a shot that travels wide. At the other end, Danny Diego gets a long sought opportunity to open the scoring but a push too far gives possession to goalkeeper Roberto Santos. Off this spotkick from Nelson Moss, Diego gets a shot at goal and again his attempt is foiled by Roberto Santos and at the half we have a nil-nil ballgame.
Meanwhile, during intermission we caught up with BFL President Maito Perdomo and we tried to find out more about the national team’s problems going into Sunday’s game at the People’s Stadium against El Salvador.
Maito Perdomo, President, BFL
“The national team walked out of a workout session on Tuesday. As a result of that, they made certain demands to the national selections committee. Our league met with some of the owners and the executive of the league to try and reach a consensus with the BNFA. We are meeting with them on Monday at 12 o’clock to iron out this problem because we have a big game with Salvador next week Sunday and it’s too close for a controversy like this and we are trying to get this thing done amicably. Try to meet the demands and try and meet some kind of medium with it.”
James Adderly
“May I ask if there are any specific proposals the BFL will take to the BNFA?”
Maito Perdomo
“The BFL is certainly…we are behind our team, our players, all the players are from the BFL. We are supporting the players, but at the same time we want to make a compromise, compromise with them. It’s not like we are going to go out there and say every demand has got to be met. But we are going to look at the demands and we are going to negotiate with it. I have no idea why it came up at this time. It is unfortunate that we only have a week. I think if we have had fifteen days to a month, then a lot of changes could have been made. I am not seeing a lot of structural changes in the management of the teams and even the national coach. I don’t see a big change unless he walks out.”
In 2nd half play it’s Francis Arzu forcing the offense from Grigamandala when he fires this missile that inches outside the sticks. Down field Verdes responds with this floater from Julio Ayala that almost tricks Stanley Reneau, but he tips it over the crossbar.
It’s 14 minutes into 2nd half when Nelson Moss comes up with this banana kick fumbled by Santos and before he could recover the streaking Francis Arzu smacks it into the net for the 1-nil Grigamandala lead. Things get real physical after this and watch as Cunningham sinks his foot in Danny Diego’s breadbasket – referee Jones rules penalty.
Diego steps up to exact sweet revenge, but it’s Roberto Santos, who shines with the biggest save of this ballgame. The retaliation comes from Mark Leslie and this wicked elbow lands on the eye of Julio Ayala, who has to be carried off bleeding profusely while Leslie gets chased with a red card.
Danny Diego in an attempt to get possession here falls victim to a mean sandwich and has to be carried off the field, but he would return. A desperate Real Verdes now presses for the equalizer and between Earl Peters and Erwin Contreras they should have come up with a goal here but they both issue a pardon to Dangriga.
Roberto Cunningham then attacks from off the right wing and fires only to see Stanley Reneau handle his launch. Meanwhile folks things are rough on the field but this move by the law is an obvious over reaction that could be attributed to the excitement of the ballgame.
In the closing moments this corner from Earl Peters forces Reneau to come up with a save and he does. And when the long whistle blows it brings the 1-zip regulation big W for Dangriga, who moves to 5-0 in playoff action. We caught up with Headcoach “Garrincher” Adderly.
Anthony “Garrincher” Adderly, Headcoach, Grigamandala
“James, we made a promise that we’d try to complete the first round without a goal scored against us and without losing a game and we have done it. That’s why it’s emotional for us in winning this game today.”
James Adderly
“There might have been a breakdown of strategy in this particular ball game. Obviously, Danny Diego tried to do a little bit too much, how did that read out?”
Anthony “Garrincher” Adderly
“Danny is our better player on this team and we depend on him a lot especially now that we are missing a lot of our players and we expect Danny to lift his level up a little bit and today the team was flat. Perhaps the Sagitun team wore us out a bit, we played a very strong game and today we were a bit flat.”
Meanwhile in other BFL action Kulture Yabra was stunned by a 1-zip blast from La Victoria at Corozal yesterday while on Saturday Sagitun blanked the San Pedro Dolphins 2-nil at Independence.
In closing we wish our national team maximum success against El Salvador this Sunday at the People’s Stadium.
