Games 248 and 249 (WZ'99 Vexillium Cup), 01-14-300:

Game 248: Whitlam - Ansonia:
 
 The Technical Information:

Final score: WHITLAM 6 - ANSONIA 0
Played in: Hawke Bitter Stadium, Gough, Whitlam
Attendance: 120,000
Referee: Alfredo Hugo (Lendosan Confederation)
Goals: Walford (FRW, 13th), Walford (FRW, 33rd, pen), Armstark (FRW, 41st), Blacklock (FRW, 55th), Blacklock (FRW, 76th), Walford (FRW, 90th)
Yellow cards: Abdullah (ANS, 33rd), Biafra (FRW, 51st)
Substitutions: Haqim for Abdullah (ANS, 45th), Sungiap for Omara (ANS, 56th)

Fireworks Before The Game, Fireworks During The Game, Fireworks After The Game!

If ever there was a category for best atmosphere at a football match at the All-Time football awards, this would have to be it. No doubt about it.

The atmosphere had absolutely everything going for it. It was the co-opening game of the VexCup, it was being played in front of the largest crowd of all time for a football match, in the largest stadium in the world, the Hawke Bitter Stadium, which is in the largest city of one of the most football-fanatical countries in the world. Added to that, it was being beamed across the world to hundreds of millions of people via satellite.

At 6:30, one hour before the match there was a fireworks display stemming from the field for 12 minutes. That held the crowd, who was practically entirely there by then, in awe.

Then 7:25 came. Ansonia and Whitlam came on, led by Referee Alfredo Hugo, to fireworks set up from the penalty spots at both ends. As the fireworks died down, renowned Whitlamite tenor Laurence Pavaron sang the Ansonian and Whitlamite anthems, accompanied by the Gough City Marching Band.

It was 7:30. As Alfredo Hugo blew the joint first whistle of VexCup 99, fireworks were set off simultaneously from locations surrounding the Hawke Bitter Stadium. The fireworks were in such different locations as the stadium carpark, rooftops of factories, the roof of the stadium offices, the rooves of the stands, even the back yards of local neighbours who were offered free tickets to the game in exchange for the use of their back yards in blowing up big fireworks. It is reported that the house of one of the back-yard owners was damaged by the fireworks, and at the time of this release, the owners don't even know it.

Before the game, everybody knew that this opening game would be a glorious victory for Whitlam. Everything was in the Dragons' favour. They had experience, and they were one of the top teams on Vexillium. Ansonia hadn't even played a single game, and had no organisation.

But the Dragons were not prepared to be shocked. Ansonia managed to break through the Dragons' defence three times in the first 13 minutes, and get shots off. However, the Ansonians evidently hadn't dwelt much on shooting practice, because all three shots were not accurate, although one did nick the top of the crossbar.

At the thirteenth minute, Walford for the Dragons scored with a volley from a Ryan McGaw corner kick, after Kras Vratar made a finger-tip save from a Blacklock strike. That put the Dragons up one to zip, and from that, they never looked back.

Walford followed his first goal up twenty minutes afterwards with a penalty off an Aasim Abdullah foul, for which he was yellow carded. The penalty was no problem for Walford, in fact he probably would have received some major cussing if he had missed it.

The third goal came eight minutes later, with a superb solo run from half way done by Armstark, who sidestepped the charging Vratar to finish off the half. That really ignited the crowd, because one of their own scored a goal. The Dragons had done enough to win the game by half time, but no, they weren't finished yet.

At half time, Ansonia, who logically thought they had no chance against Whitlam, realised that their view was only confirmed. Nonetheless, they took off the yellow-carded Aasim Abdullah and replaced him with Luqman Haqim to try and improve matters.

That didn't work. Ten minutes after the second half whistle, the Gough crowd was treated to their fourth home goal of the night, this time by striker Blacklock. The crowd roared as Whitlam continued to roar inexorably towards their victory.

The goal also signalled Ansonia's intention to bring off the tired Maksia Omara and replace him with Oh Sungiap. Not that it would make much difference.

Blacklock supplemented his first goal with a second, a shot to go past the keeper, off the crossbar in the right hand corner, and in the back of the net. But the Dragons hadn't finished at 5-0.

In the first minute of injury time, Walford brought up his hatrick, and finished off the game in style, with a headed goal after the ball ricocheted off Kras Vratar's hand in a save.

No surprises in the end result for both sides, and the whole of Gough celebrated by launching fireworks, not massive jumbo fireworks like from the stadium, but it still made for great viewing across all of Gough.

Ansonia plays United Territories on Tuesday in Forde, and then Whitlam plays United Territories on Sunday week evening in Fisher, at the Gazelle Ground.

Final score: EASTERN ZARTANIA 4 - WANG CHUNG 0
Played in: King Bruno Stadium, Imperial City, Eastern Zartania
Attendance: 110,000
Referee: Trevor Speaks (Bowdani)
Goals: McBride (KTZ, 46th), Faulkner (KTZ, 58th), Wilson (KTZ, 87th), Faulkner (KTZ, 90th)
Yellow cards: None
Substitutions: Zhiyi for Chow (WCG, 45th), Xinxiang for Tay (WCG, 45th), Cross for Rohal (KTZ, 57th)

King Bruno: "They kicked some major Wang Chung ass!"

Eastern Zartania started off their new year with a win over Wang Chung, although the Chungese showed many promising signs about them.

>From the beginning whistle, the Wang Chung defence knew exactly what they were doing, but they were doing a lot of running around doing what they were doing. The Zartanians had few chances, even though they outnumbered the Chungese defence five to four. The Lightning pair of Ben Nurytch and Dan Wilson had little chances to feed the ball in from their wings because the Chungese defenders Ing and captain Mendric shut them down very quickly. Wang Chung's chances on offence were pathetic, because their forwards are of a lower class of play than their defenders, and the Zartanian defenders outnumbered them as well.

At the half time break, the possession statistics were in Zartania's favour, 61% to 39%, however the time spent in each third was drastically different. The ball spent 64% of the half in Wang Chung's third of the field, 24% in the middle third, and only 12% in Zartania's third. That was reflected by the fact that Wang Chung hardly had any attacking chances at all, despite actually having a presence on the midfield wing. Because of the Eastern Zartanian's relentless pushing in the defence, Ringo Lam, the Talons' coach, found it necessary to substitute his two most tired defenders, probably cursing the IVEFA rule that only two substitutions are allowed per game.

The two new defenders, Zhiyi and Xinxiang, were very inexperienced, and ill equipped to handle the might of the Zartanians. That was noticed when about 90 seconds after kick off Rino McBride, the left forward in the 'Thunder' pack, scored a faultless goal, that would you believe it, went straight through Fong Lo-Yat's legs, and put the Zarts 1-0 up. The 110,000 crowd at the new King Bruno Stadium in Imperial City went wild. As a matter of fact, the King Bruno Stadium is the second-largest stadium on the planet, second to the Hawke Bitter Stadium, where Whitlam played Ansonia at the same time as this match. (See game commentary Whitlam vs Ansonia for a report).

Afterwards, the game was dormant for about 10 minutes, until Bao for the Talons broke through the entire defence in the 56th minute. He only had the goalie to beat, when he.... launched the shot and hit the crossbar. The ball went straight up in the air, and seemed to float for around 5 seconds, until it came back down, and the 6'5" Jenkins sprang himself up, and caught the ball when it was just under two feet above the crossbar. Jenkins held the ball until Tom Cross was in position after Christopher Delvana told him to substitute off Trika Rohal. Jenkins then rolled the ball to Cross, who dribbled it for about 10 feet before deploying a boot downfield that went from about 5 yards from the edge of the 18 yard box to Johan Faulkner, in the middle up front, who would also have been only 5 yards from the edge of the other 18 yard box. Faulkner made it past Xinxiang with no trouble, and kicked the ball towards the corner. Fong Lo-Yat got a hand to it, but it wasn't enough, as the !
ball sailed effortlessly into the top corner. And as the catchphrase goes, "THE CROWD GOES WILD!".

It was quiet on the goal front for nearly the final thirty minutes, until Dan Wilson, one of the Lightning duo, took it down the wing from a Howard Duvall feed. He started to make in-roads in, and it looked like he'd take it all the way with no trouble. And that was the case. He pulled back for the shot on the corner of the 18 yard box, and the shot went past two Talon defenders and the goalie, to glide into the corner of the net. 3-0 up, and that was a great opening victory for Zartania.

But they weren't done yet. To add the icing on the cake, Johan Faulkner scored his second of the match with some expert passing to confuse and obfuscate the Talon defenders, to make the final result egregious to the Talons' chances of advancement in the competition.

However, Wang Chung definitely has some potential. This commentator would have to say that we should all look to the Talons' game against Phoenix Town on Wednesday at 2:30. And I wouldn't be surprised if Wang Chung were a force to be reckoned with, come Copa VexaNova, wherever it will be held.