Courtesy: www.thefa.com

Mixed bag in Montenegro for Three Lions Futsal team

England’s Futsal team put in two impressive away performances against Montenegro this weekend, winning one and losing one in their double-header.

With physically intimidating opponents, ranked nine places above the Three Lions, Peter Sturgess’s side narrowly lost the first game 5-4 after making a number of careless individual errors to hand the hosts victory.

But they responded in positive fashion to claim an important 2-1 win in the second match so can take many positives from the two performances as they build up to the European Qualifiers in January.

Typically the England Futsal team start their season in slow fashion with the early annual autumn fixture witnessing an incomplete performance and the first match in beautiful Tivat proved no different.

On the whole, England dominated the game and looked a better team with the players looking fitter, sharper and more technically gifted than their Montenegrin opponents.

England had long periods of quality possession, but the players looked a little rusty and somewhat short of playing at their full potential, with the final ball often missing during a first half without any meaningful chances.

Montenegro soon demonstrated that they were a force to be reckoned with, and whilst they perhaps did not possess the overall technical quality to outplay England, they defended resiliently with strength and a physicality that at times bordered on excessive.

The hosts were patient and waited for England to make errors, which disappointingly from England’s perspective came too frequently for Sturgess’ liking.

Draskovic capitalised on an English mistake to hammer home the first goal to give Montenegro the lead at half time.

England came out rejuvenated in the second half and had one of their brightest spells, with Stuart Cook scoring almost immediately after the break to level the scores.

New captain Ben Mortlock then rounded off an excellent counter-attack moments later to make it 2-1 to England.

Montenegro looked deflated, but the Lions lost their focus and went through a crazy seven minute period where a string of basic individual errors presented the Montenegrins with numerous goal-scoring opportunities which to the glee of the home support were taken. Montenegro slotted four unanswered goals during this period to give them a 5-2 lead.

A dazed England struggled to compose themselves, but the excellent Luke Ballinger was a thorn in the Montenegrin side throughout, and doing particularly well not to be provoked by the intimidating play of the home team.

And it was Ballinger that got England back into the game in the 33rd minute with a clever close-range flick to make it 5-3. England found their stride and quickly made it 5-4 with Cook grabbing his second with a strong finish.

For the remaining five minutes, the Montenegrin goal was under constant pressure but England failed to grab the equaliser that they rightfully deserved, with Ballinger missing a golden opportunity in the last moments of the game.

In previous times the England players may have felt sorry for themselves after failing to get something out of a game that they dominated.






Posted by Mico Martic --> mico.martic@futsalplanet.com