Global, Kaya give selves boost with PFL wins BACK-TO-BACK WINS
GLOBAL Cebu FC and Kaya FCMakati made it a winning Sunday in the Philippines Football League (PFL), defeating their respective opponents to pad their spots in the standings.
Global, playing on its home field of Cebu City Sports Complex for the second straight time, was a 3-0 winner over Stallion Laguna FC on Sunday night while earlier in the day Kaya downed host San Miguel Davao Aguilas FC, 5-1, in Tagum.
In front of its home town crowd for the second time, Global gave their fans another reason to celebrate as it stepped up its game in the second half to dispatch Stallion and earned full three points to move it to solo second place with a 6-2-2 record and 20 points.
It dislodged erstwhile secondrunning JPV Marikina FC (6-03) at 18 points and is now three points behind league-leading FC Meralco Manila (7-2-0).
After being held to a goalless tie in the opening half by visiting Stallion, Global cranked things up in the second fold of the contest with veteran Misagh Bahadoran leading the charge.
The Philippine Azkals member Bahadoran broke the stalemate in the 49th minute after beating Stallion goalkeeper Benito Rosalla, Jr. inside the box to give his team the 1-0 lead, sending the 5,000 or so Global fans in the venue into celebration.
Mr. Bahadoran then added another goal in the 67th minute when he followed up on teammate Shu Sasaki’s foiled lob to make it to 2-0 for the host team.
While his first jab at scoring was stopped by the Stallion defense, Mr. Sasaki redeemed himself in the 86th minute with a goal off an impressive and rare bicycle kick to complete the shutout of Laguna.
With the loss, Stallion (0-3-7) remains winless 10 games to date in the national football league and currently sits on seventh place in the eight- team field with three points.
After encountering a rough patch previously, Kaya, meanwhile, has won back-to-back games with its conquest of the Aguilas.
The win was in follow up to its prior win over Stallion, 3-1, in Biñan and thrust Kaya ( 5- 2- 3) back inside the top four of the standings with 17 points.
A brace from forward Joven Bedic and goals each from defender Alfred Osei and substitutes Eric Giganto and Kenshiro Daniels did it for Kaya in a game it described after as something it really worked hard for despite the final score.
Mr. Bedic opened the scoring for Kaya in the 20th minute off a Robert Mendy cross that gave his team the upper hand after scary moments in the early goings of the match from the host team.
Davao, however, would do a steady job of not letting things get out of hand for the rest of the opening half thereafter.
The Aguilas then pulled even in the 49th minute care of forward Nikola Grubjesic.
It proved to be the last chance for Davao to be on the board though as Kaya began to cascade on the Aguilas after that.
Mr. Osei broke the tie in the 58th minute, minutes after Davao was reduced to 10 men after Jason Cordova was red-carded for a rough play on Kaya’s Marwin Angeles.
Mr. Bedic made it 3-1 for his team in the 76th minute with a powerful low shot.
Davao native Giganto added to the misery of the Aguilas when he stretched Kaya’s lead to 4-1, in the 87th minute before Mr. Daniels put on the finishing touches with a goal right before the final whistle.
“It wasn’t easy. In the first half Davao really showed what they could do. They even scored. But after they went a man down, they started leaving a lot of space for us to operate. We exploited them every chance we could,” said Kaya coach Noel Marcaida after the game.
With the loss, Davao’s struggles continued, leaving it with a 0- 4- 5 record and four points, good for sixth place. —