MAFL Season 2 Semifinals

United and Immortals advance to the final championship face-off on Tula 25. United was the solid favourite to win their bout, while the Immortals have defied all expectations to defeat the San Olympus Titans.

---

United - Dynamos

Tula 17 • Europa Stadium

Dynamos crushed by United in the semifinals.

Despite flying-high for the first half of the season, the Dynamos were devastated by United on the pitch today. Unfortunately for the Dynamos, United was simply the superior team in every way this match. The United offensive line was beautifully in-sync, and executed flawless plays that punched through Dynamo’s defenses. Just as impressive was the way that the defensive players anticipated Petrovich’s and Karaaria’s attempts to set up an attack, and strategically crippled their plays.

United Manager, Reinmann, wisely deployed Sulzberger, United’s star goalkeeper, who shut out the Dynamos. Every. Single. Shot. The Dynamos were clearly frustrated as the number of bookings and fouls spiked in the second half when they still hadn’t gotten a single shot past Sulz.

GOALS

• 1ST 4’ Fuchs scores an early goal for United with an assist from Baranato

• 1ST 12’ Barnato (United) intercepts a pass to midfield and heads the ball past a surprised Danilovich

• 2ND 9’ Fuchs (United) picks up a pass from Dennis in the box and scores with a right-footed flick into the left corner

• 2ND 18’ Ivanova (United) dribbles on a breakaway, and scores with a high kick that narrowly misses the crossbar

SHOTS
17	13

POSSESSION
43%	57%

FOULS
4	3

---

Titans - Immortals

Tula 18 • San Olympus Park

immortals celebrate after their hard-earned victory!

Immortals take out the Titans to advance to the finals.

Viewers across Mars held their breath as the come-back-kings, the Immortals, beat the season favourites at San Olympus Park today. An elated Parkar, celebrated with teammates after scoring the winning goal in the final minutes of regulation time.

“This is an amazing experience!” said Parkar after the match. This is definitely a far cry from last season, when Parkar was involved in an accidental collision with Yamen Warren that resulted in the first MAFL fatality.

Both teams played cautiously in the first half, testing the waters and sniping shots at each other that were easily blocked. Both teams exploded into action in the second half, however, with Lanka smashing through the defenses on a breakaway to open up scoring with powerhouse kick.

Immortals now head to Europa to face United for the Season 2 championship!

GOALS

• 2ND 6’ Lanka (Immortals) boosts high to head the ball past De Sisto’s left shoulder.

• 2ND 10’ Hagendoorn (Immortals) scores a low, right-footed flick as she dribbles past the defense.

• 2ND 16’ Carballel (Titans) counters an attack in midfield and converts it into a shot into left of the net.

• 2ND 20’ Nash (Titans) scores an equaliser with an assist from Terrell.

• 2ND 28’ Parka (Immortals) smokes the ball past De Sisto with a right-footed smash for the winning goal.

SHOTS
10	19

POSSESSION
50%	50%

FOULS
3	3

---

Stats & Standings

Top Scorers
	Uday Lanka	19
	Readale Nash	16
	Darkeem Dennis	15
	Arwa Farra	13
	Ilya Petrovich	12
	Yvonne Barnato	12
	Qigang Lian	11
	Marcus Ekberg	10
	Lennard Fuchs	10
	Stephen Liu	9

Comet's Sail To Finals

Solis, Kumbha 1, 2077, m249

Today' battle for the last ticket to the MAFL finals became a high powered shoot-out between the league’s top two scoring teams.  In the regular season, Al’amal scored 36 goals  vs the Comets’ 34 goals.

It took just one minute of play for the scoring to begin; a deep cross from Mussadiq Baddour from the left flank was met by Hamad Fayad who crushed a volley into the top corner past Zaida Agre. 

Al’amal 1 Comets 0.

Earlier this week, it was unclear if Agre would be fit to return for the semi-final match after sustaining injury in the final regular season match against the Titans.  But before any uncertainty could set in, Comets Kemina De Marco would respond just minutes later with the equalizer.

Al’amal 1 Comets 1.

And the goals kept coming.

Stephen Liu, MAFL Defender of the Year,  won the ball from Mahmood Rahimjust outside the penalty area and unleashed a shot into the top far corner for the go ahead goal.

Comets 2 Al’amal 1.

After such a blistering start to the match with three goals in the first six minutes, the pace slowed down, until the Comets dialled up the offence at the 15th minute mark.  After Liu intercepted a weak clearing attempt from Lana Gonzalez, he moved into the penalty area and hit an powerful low shot into the far corner for his second goal of the match.

Comets 3 Al’amal 1.

Right off the ensuing kickoff, the Comets Aba Samma met a deep cross from Liu and back-heeled it past a hapless al-Pour.

Comets 4 Al’amal 1.

With an endless barrage from the Comets, it was fortunate Al'amal was able to hold the rest of the half with just a three goal deficit.

During the halftime interval, Al’amal manager Haajid Nasr tried to motivate and reinvigorate his squad.  When play resumed, he switched strategy from a balanced attack to a more aggressive strategy, borrowing a page from Paulo Salgado’s move that lead to yesterday's Titans come-from-behind victory. 

But alas, that was yesterday.

Today, that move backfired as the Comets exploited their deficient defensive coverage. It took only 4 minutes for Luz Obregón to surge past the shallow defence and connect with a pass from Bradley, which he finished with an acrobatic bicycle kick over a leaping al-Pour.

Comets 5 Al’amal 1.

9 minutes into the 2nd half, Liu gave the Al’amal defence the runaround and beat al-Pour once more to complete his hat-trick.

Comets 6  Al’amal 1.

The Comets started to tighten their defence, nursing their lead.

Desperate to instill some life in his team, al-Pour boosted a charged kick that sailed across the field, landed just past the Comets’ penalty area where it took a freakish bounce past Agre and into the net.

Comets 6 Al’amal 2.

Just 15 minutes later, Fayad found another opportunity to close the gap.  Dragging the ball behind his planted foot with the inside of his crossing foot, he turned and accelerated away from Liu before slotting home Al’amal’s third goal of the match.

Comets 6 Al’amal 3.

With 20 minutes remaining Al’amal’s  poured on the offense with two near scoring chances – one over the Comets net, and another that went wide.

At the 84th minute, Bradley, Liu and Samma drove in the final dagger to shatter any home for an Al'amal comback.  With intricate passing around the edge of the penalty area, Bradley set up Samma, who placed a clean into the Al’amal goal.

Final: Comets 7 Al’amal 3.

“Titans said they owned us in the regular season,” said Bradley. “But the past is the past. It will only take one win next week for them to eat those words.  Based on today’s match, I like our chances."

Next week, Comet's make the Journey to San Olympus Park for the first MAFL Championship Match!

MAFL Titans vs. Immortals Semi-finals

Saturni, Aquarius 28, 2077, m249

After a festive awards celebration last week, the questions leading up to the first semi-final match began.

Who would prevail? The Best Team or the Team with the Best Player?

Would the Titans, recipients of the MAFL Best Team Award, climb another step closer to the mountain top, or would MAFL MVP Uday Lanka, lead his Immortals to a shot at Championship Immortality.

Would MVP Lanka shine as he did in their Week 3 matchup in San Olympus, with a legendary 4 goals that day?

Or would the Titans deploy their league leading team defence to neutralize the Amrita offence and hold them to a single goal like they did in Week 10 and Week 17.

Many questions which were finally answered today; The Titans responded with another 2 – 1 win.

“Sorry to spoil everyone’s expectations but the prevailing wisdom in any team sport, especially in Football, is that the best team usually prevails over the team with the best player,” said a happy Titans manager, Paulo Salgado in the post-game interview.

But Salgado wasn’t always smiling throughout the match.  In fact, Salgado wasn’t smiling for most of the match, as his team narrowly escaped defeat at the last minute.

At the 17th minute, a sliding tackle on the Immortals’ Tia Mancebo from Titans defender María Carballal, led to a Yellow Card given to Carballal and a Free Kick awarded to Mancebo.

And Mancebo delivered a fabulous free kick that whipped over the wall of Titans players, over a leaping IcilioDe Sisto, and into the far top corner to give the Immortals the 1 – 0 lead.

And things got worse for the Titans. Ten minutes later, the Titans’ Tia Shandu was given a Yellow Card for a questionable push against the Immortals’ Uday Lanka. Shandu’s disdain for the call escalated into a heated discussion and nudge of a referee-bot, which led to a full on Red Card and dismissal from the match.

The Titans were unable to gain any control over the 1st half. While Titans’ leading scorer Readale Nash was suited up, he was in the sidelines nursing the injury he suffered two weeks ago.

His absence was missed as the offensive malaise continued into the 2nd half as the Immortals were able to keep the Titans off the scoreboard for the next twenty minutes.

Thirty Minutes.  

Forty Minutes.

Thankfully, the Titans defenders were able to neutralize Lanka and the Immortals offence for an equal period of time.  

With only 6 minutes remaining in the game, disaster struck in front of the Titan goal.  An accidental collision between Titan defender Tarik Girma and goalkeeper, resulted in a dislocated shoulder for De Sisto.  Usian Busara was called in to finish match.

This turned out to be the pivotal moment.  With five minutes left and their season on the line, Salgado made his move as he shifted to an offensive attack formation – 3 forwards, 4 midfielders, and 3 defenders. No risk, no reward.

Titans mounted wave after wave of pressure on a tiring Immortals team in the dying few minutes.

And it paid off as the Immortals’ Jag Parker committed a foul outside of their own penalty area which resulted in a free kick awarded to the Titans.

After a quick team consultation, Jube Terrell took the kick.

Instead of taking the more frequently used inswinger kick, Terrell delivered an outswinger kick that bent away from the goal, out of reach from the startled wall of Immortals players and from the goalkeeper who instinctively lunged after the ball.

Captain Raenia Ware, criticized for not producing goals in the regular season, gets the all-important equalizer to keep Titans alive.

Raenia Ware streaked in from the left side, leaped and connected with a deft header that sent the ball the other direction, top right corner, and away from an overly committed goalkeeper on the left side.  Goal!  And the game was tied 1 -1 at the 89th minute.

Just when it looked like regular time was over, with both teams resigned to Overtime Penalty Kicks to decide their fate, a fantastic long pass out of the Titans defence by Maria Carballal caught the Immortals players off guard, and caught the foot of a rushing Tarik Lema Girma who controlled the ball and dispatched a superb chip over the Immortals goalkeeper from the edge of the penalty area.

For the deciding goal and win! 2 – 1 Titans over Immortals.

And as the Titans players jumped all over Grima to celebrate, the Immortals players and manager rushed the referee to confirm that the game ending whistle and signal had indeed been delivered before the goal.

No whistle, no signal. Goal stands. And then the game ending whistle and signal came shortly afterwards.

“We had control for the majority of the match but we let this one slip away in the final minutes,” said a dejected Lanka afterwards. “I wasn’t the best player today and I will take full blame for our team’s loss.”

“It ain’t over till it’s over,” said a jubilant Ware in the post-match locker room celebration. “In this game, you play hard until the final end. Our team never gave up. The Best Team won today.”

Titans advance to the Finals and await results from tomorrow's Comets vs. Al'Amal Match.