Flying Kiwis - August 18
Winston Reid – West Ham United (English Premier League)
Winnie’s Hammers may have done a number on Arsenal last week, but they had a fair wakeup call against Leicester. Turns out creating a top quality football team requires more than just a new managed and a couple good signings.
Although it seems to be working for the Foxes. Shinji Okazaki and Riyad Mahrez scored the goals in a 2-1 win, new boy Dimitri Payet pulling one back for WHU in the second half but that was all. Young Reece Oxford got another start, he almost scored from an early header, but he was subbed off at half time. They got the best of Arsenal by soaking up plenty of pressure but in this game they had 69% of possession and too often didn’t know what to do with it.
They did have their chances though. Diafra Sahko wasted one or two of them. Then in injury time, West Ham won a corner and up went the keeper Adrian. The ball was headed clear and Adrian went clumsily trying to win the ball back and succeeded only in a completely reckless sprigging of Jamie Vardy’s chest, a straight red card for him and it’ll come with a suspension. Carl Jenkinson played the last two minutes in goal.
It was an uneventful game for Reid with most of it taking place in front of him. Nonetheless it’s one he’ll probably be disappointed in, especially after the heights of last week. He passed the ball out well as usual and was strong in the air, but to concede twice in the first half will have been a major annoyance. The first was a well worked move down his right side of defence, though there wasn’t much he could do about Marc Albrighton’s gasp-inducingly good cross as he tried to close him down.
The second goal came down that side too, with Reid dragged out of the area initially (there was a new right back, Carl Jenkinson returning to his usual role after missing the Arsenal game due to the standard condition that a player won’t play against the team he’s on loan from – Jenko in for Tomkins was the only change). He recovered to stay with Albrighton’s jinking run, smartly killing any angle to shoot from, but instead he just pulled the ball back to a wide-open Mahrez, who made zero mistake in doubling the lead. There was also a nervy moment early on as Adrian and Reid mis-communicated on a long ball that nearly got picked off by an attacker, though the keeper just managed to deal with it in the end.
Up Next: Home to Bournemouth, 2am Sunday (NZT)
Chris Wood – Leeds United (English Championship)
Well, now. It wasn’t the best week for Leeds United and it wasn’t the best week for Chris Wood. He played the full 90 on the weekend against Reading, a game which ended up in a 0-0 draw so boring that multiple yellow cards made the 100 second highlight package. Woody was actually in the midst of a few of the better chances that there were, shooting into the side netting from an angle in the first half and hammering a chest and volley just over the bar in the second. His aerial threat was one of the easy fall-back options for Leeds, though in truth no goal was ever close to forthcoming. A real dud.
But even that was better than the Capital One Cup loss to Doncaster Rovers (League One) on Friday morning. It began in fine fashion, LUFC taking the lead through Lewis Cook in the 14th minute, his first goal for the club, but Cook soon turned villain as he was sent off for a two-footed tackle later in the half. Doncaster had already equalised from the penalty spot by then and 1-1 it stayed through 120 minutes. Leeds were the more prominent side but they lacked much of a cutting edge playing with 10 men and were clearly exhausted by the end. Two awful bits of defending had gifted the game back to Doncaster.
Chris Wood came on after 67 minutes but he couldn’t spark much either. To penalties it went, the first four takers all scoring theirs before Sam Byram shot over the crossbar for Leeds. Chris Wood stepped up to take their fourth kick, needing to score or else Doncaster were shooting for the victory…
Whoops.
Leeds lost 4-2 on spot kicks after a 1-1 draw. The first time in their history that they’ve been eliminated in the first round on the League Cup.
Up Next: Thursday morning, 6.45am away to Bristol City and then 11.45pm Saturday at home against Sheffield Wednesday (NZT)
Tommy Smith – Ipswich Town (English Championship)
Ipswich also had a league cup game to traverse, they also started without their Flying Kiwi… only they won. 2-1 over Stevenage, though a late penalty shout could have changed things had it been given. Stevenage manager Teddy Sheringham (!) wasn’t too upset at the non-call, though admitted confusion as the linesman had initially flagged for a foul, only to be overruled by the ref. Hence the controversy. Anyway, Smith came on for the last quarter of an hour or so to help seal the deal. He also wore this snappy chequered suit to the game:
Then back, a few days later, for a home game against Sheffield Wednesday. Mick McCarthy has challenged his team to go the full season unbeaten at Portman Road, so far so good. Again they fell behind (just as they had against Stevenage) but again they fought back to win.
19 minutes in, after an opening spell mostly dominated by Ipswich, Smith was beaten for pace and skill by Marco Matias though he at least managed to guide him wide enough that his cross/shot was pushed away by the Town keeper but it only went as far as Ross Wallace at the far post and Weds led 1-0. The deficit lasted a total of a couple minutes. A long ball was poorly dealt with (not even dealt with at all, really) and Freddie Sears beat the keeper from a tight angle.
That was the way it stayed until the second half, when Ryan Fraser picked up the scraps of an attack by beating his marker and whipping in a ball that the goalie couldn’t handle, leaving Tommy Smith, none other, with a sitter of a header from all of four yards out.
“It was just a case of being in the right place at the right time, the keeper’s parried it straight to my head and I was three or four yards out so it was probably harder to miss.” – Tommy Smith
Just as they did against Brentford last week (when they blew a 2-0 lead in injury time to draw), Ipswich sat back and got more defensive as the game dragged on. But this time they survived. 2-1 the final score and a great start to the new season.
Up Next: 6.45am Wednesday vs Burnley and 2am Sunday at Preston (NZT)
Bill Tuiloma – Olympique de Marseille (French Ligue 1)
Nothing much to add here other than that Marseille showed no discernible difference in performance between losing last week, their manager resigning, and losing this week. 1-0 away to Reims. Tuiloma wasn’t on the bench, he took the field at centre back for the reserves instead, as they got their campaign underway with a 1-0 loss to Stade Montois. Un-embed-able highlights are here. That’s Billy getting beaten for the goal at 1:11, though he does a couple nice defensive things early in the vid.
Also, Jurgen Klopp turned down the OM job, if you were wondering.
Up Next: The reserves host Sete, 4am Sunday; The seniors host Troyes at 7am Monday (NZT)
Ryan Thomas – PEC Zwolle (Dutch Eredivisie)
Frustratingly, the Dutch season has started with an injury to Ryan Thomas. A sneaky injury too, one that seemed to appear out of nowhere. It was feared that it could be a serious one too as Thomas was shipped off for an MRI but it came back all clear.
Manager Ron Jans: "He had some fluid in his knee and then you do get a little worried if it takes longer, he does not know how it happened.”
(Blame google for the sloppy translation, he goes on to say the knee was swollen).
So Thommo missed out on the first game of the Eredivisie, a game which Zwolle looked to be in control of after two goals in three minutes (between the 31st and 33rd) only to then concede twice between the 70-77th minutes for a 2-2 draw at home to Cambuur. That was midweek, and it was hoped he’d be available for their second game on the Saturday, but he ended up missing that one too. However the result was much better, with Zwolle travelling to promoted De Graafschap and coming away with a 3-0 win, all of the goals coming between the 50th and 66th minutes.
Up Next: PEC Zwolle vs FC Twente, 10.30pm Sunday (NZT)
Marco Rojas – FC Thun (Swiss Super League)
It’s been an inconsistent campaign so far to say the least for FC Thun. Into the final round of qualifying for the Europa League, they travel to the Czech Republic to play Sparta Prague on Friday (NZT) and they just pumped Solothurn 4-0 to advance to the next round of the Swiss Cup too. A completely expected result against a weaker side, it was still a decent win. Rojas played 58 minutes, setting up the second goal, before being subbed off for new singing Gonzalo Zarate.
But then there’s also their league form. A 3-1 loss to Basel away isn’t a complete shocker but it means they’ve now just one win and four losses to start the comp. That has them dead last on the table. Rojas was an unused sub against Basel, though he came up against a couple of familiar faces, former Sydney FC striker Marc Janko scored a double and ex-Melbourne Victory teammate Adama Traore also played for the opponents (Traore left Melly to play for Tyler Boyd’s current team, Vitoria SC, before he signed with Basel in January).
Up Next: Sparta Prague (away), Friday 5am (NZT)
Tyler Boyd - Vitória S.C. (Portuguese Primeira Liga)
Did you know that Tyler Boyd is now playing for the same club that Manchester United signed a particular legendary Portuguese winger from? Yep, the one and only… Bebe. Okay, ‘legendary’ is a stretch.
Anyway, Boyd’s been given the number 32, though he’s not yet in the frame to feature for the top team. He is, however, a feature for the B team, who play in the Second Division (Segunda Liga). He played 83 minutes of their opening game, a 1-0 loss to Santa Clara, before getting in an hour against Oriental, scoring the opening goal to top off a counter attack inside five minutes of a game that ended up as a 4-4 thriller. Vitoria were up 3-2 with three minutes left, only to concede in the 88th, re-take the lead in the 89th and concede again in injury time.
Up Next: The reserves are in action 4am Sunday vs Freamunde (NZT)
Jeremy Brockie & Michael Boxall – SuperSport United (South African Premier Soccer League)
After losing in the MTN8 Cup last week, SuperSport got to turn their attentions towards a positive start to the new league season. Those attentions were not in vain either, as SSU held on to a 1-0 victory at home vs Orlando Pirates, the difference being a 23rd minute goal from a New Zealand international. Except that this time it wasn’t Brockie, it was Boxall, in his league debut, finishing from close range on the end of a free kick. Even picked up the man of the match award, capping off a nice week of non-striker Flying Kiwis goals.
Up Next: Mpumalanga Black Aces vs SuperSport United, 4am Sunday (NZT)