Kitchee vs Tai Po - Kitchee throw away 2 goal lead for second week in succession

For the second match in succession, a spirited come back by a New Territories district team saw Kitchee unable to hold onto a 2-0 lead and ultimately only take 1 point rather than all 3. The draw against Tai Po means Kitchee have already dropped 6 points in the League this campaign, more than they did in each of the last two seasons. 

Several changes to the team - same result

Kitchee Instagram

Following the disappointing draw against Yuen Long, Alex Chu made several changes to his side to try and ensure victory.  The most notable of theses was, of course, the inclusion of returning hero, Kristian Vadocz who replaced the now departed MoMo Sissoko.  

Jared Lum returned from injury to take his place up front at the expense of Cheng Chin Lung and, with Chu trying out a new 3-4-2-1 formation, we also saw Matt Lam make way for Jordi Tarres, Lucas dropping to the bench for Josep Tadic and Dani Cancela swapping for Ju Yingzhi.  

Fan's favourite, Fernando, was included in the starting lineup seemingly recovered from the injury he sustained during that 2-2 away draw in the New Territories. 

How it happened....

With Vadocz drafted straight back into the team, the Bluewaves got off to a promising start when, after just 1 minute, the Tai Po centre back, Wong Wai slipped and left Josep Tadic clean through on the 'keeper.  The Croatian was however unable to take advantage and shot straight at Li Hon Ho who was quick out of his net. A number of other chances followed, including a couple for Vadocz to mark his comeback in dream fashion, and although Kitchee were unable to take advantage, fans were starting to think that the reigning Champions may have re-found their "mojo". 

Kitchee Instagram

Kitchee did eventually take the lead after 13 minutes when Bong's rasping shot was woefully dealt with by the Tai Po 'Keeper.  The chance came about when Li Hon Ho needlessly punched the ball away rather than catching it and eventually it fell at the feet of Bong.  The Korean defender took two touches and launched his pile driver goalwards. Whilst the shot had plenty of power, it was straight at the 'keeper and would have been kept out if it were not for Li doing his best impression of Loris Karius. In any event, this was Bong's first league goal for Kitchee and only the third in his entire career so wheeled away in delight. 


15 minutes later and there was another glaring error by Li Hon Ho.  Jordi Tarres, who enjoyed an impressive return to the starting 11 for Kitchee, played a long ball forward hopefully towards Tadic. The ball looked too close to the 'keeper and should have been dealt with comfortably. However, Li hesitated in coming off his line and then missed hit his attempted clearance leaving Tadic to slot home into the empty net.  Kitchee 2 Tai Po 0 - both thanks to some absolutely terrible mistakes from the former Eastern Goalkeeper. 


In a first half where Tai Po failed to register a shot on target, Kitchee could have further increased their lead with Tadic shooting just over, following great play from Ju and Lum, and also Fernando coming close.  At half time Kitchee went in 2:0 up with the fans thinking that they be back to winning ways.

However, Tai Po had other ideas and the introduction of Michel Lugo after 56 minutes really changed the game. Now, whilst Lugo is not particularly liked by Kitchee fans (see more below), there is no denying that he is a fantastic player and alarm bells were ringing when after 68 minutes he picked up the ball 30 yards out and dribbled past 4 Kitchee players (Vadocz, Li Ng Hoi, Recio and Bong) before shooting straight at the advancing Wang Zheng Pang. It was a fantastic run by the Brazilian midfielder and but for slipping at the last moment he would have scored one of the goals of the season.

Scoop Lee Photography

Moments later and Lugo made his contribution count. Cutting in from the right hand side, he played a fine through-ball up pitch towards Harrison Sawyer who brushed off Recio and shot low across Pang into the bottom corner of the net. It was a great ball by Lugo but Vadocz has to take some criticism for not shutting him down and allowing him to play it so unopposed. Credit must also go to Sawyer who, despite only being 21, has now scored 4 goals this season and will continue to cause defences a problem thanks to his 6"4 frame. 

2:1 up with little over 20 minutes to go, most Kitchee fans would have been happy to play out the rest of the match and go home with 3 points. So you can forgive some fan's for being a little bewildered when Chu's final substitution of the game was an attacking move - to bring on Nakamura for Ju. Bringing on Tong Kin Man or Matt Lam to try and defend the lead may have been a more sensible decision rather than going for a third goal. These fears were proved right when just 1 minute later Tai Po drew level from a corner - Luis Eduardo heading in a well aimed cross from Igor Torres. 

So with 15 minutes to go, Kitchee found themselves back to square one. Plenty of chances came there way, most from corners and crosses thanks to the "Can't Catch - Won't Catch" approach of Li Han Ho but the game remained even.  With seconds remaining on the clock, Li did redeem himself for his earlier errors by making an excellent diving save following an overhead kick from Lucas. 

That was largely the last of the action and Kitchee fans and players were left disapointed having thrown away a 2 goal lead for the second match in a row.


Vadocz watch

Credit: Tai Mei Yan

The Kitchee faithful were justifiably delighted when the news of Vadocz's return to the club broke on Wednesday last week.  Kitchee have been missing a creative spark this season and it was clear that Momo Sissoko was not able to fill the whole left by the Hungarian who last year swept the board at the Hong Kong player of the season awards. So how did he do?

There is no doubt that he started brightly and clearly made a difference in the early stages of the game thanks to his more direct style.  His habit of arriving late, undetected, into the box also created a few chances and on another day he may have opened the scoring. 

However, as the match drew on he ran out of steam. For the last 30 minutes it was easy to forget that he was on the pitch. As Lugo stepped up, we really needed Vadocz to shut him down and stamp his authority on the game but this didn't happen. As mentioned above, Vadocz should have closed Lugo down faster in the build up to the first Tai Po goal. 

However, this was the Hungarian's first game in 2 months and so perhaps it is natural for him to be lacking in fitness a little - he may have also been slightly jet lagged having only just arrived in Hong Kong a few days before the match.  Hopefully, he will improve over the next couple of games.

Michel (Michelle) Lugo

Michelle, sorry, Michel, Lugo is definitely one of those players that Kitchee fans love to hate and its clear to see from the player's reaction to the taunts directed at him that he loves the attention and thrives off this "love/hate" relationship. 

The difficult relationship with Michel started on 6th May 2017 whilst he was playing for Eastern in what was definitely the biggest match of the season - the last day, title decider between Eastern and Kitchee.

At the time, Lugo was a star player for Dong Fang and had developed a fantastic partnership with Manuel Bleda, Diego Eli and James Mckee. However, he found himself on the bench that day and Eastern were already trailing 1-0 by the time he was introduced in the 21st minute. However,  rather than trying to change the game in their favour, the Eastern star spent most of the match goading and swearing at the Boundary Street stand. 

Since then this has lead to animosity between Lugo and the Bluewave faithful - mostly played out by Kitchee fans screaming "MeeeeeeeChell" at the player in a high pitch voice or mocking the brazilian for having a "girls name".  Neither or which are particularly hurtful or abusive and Lugo, to his credit, takes it in the good spirit it is intended and, as mentioned above, seems to thrive on the attention! 

Most of the Bluewave fans were therefore surprised when a group of other fans accused this singling out of Lugo of being "racist". AngryBoundaryStreet deplores racism in any form and would never sanction any behaviour that could be regarded as racism. However, screaming a player's name at him in a high pitch voice is not racist. It is stupid, childish and perhaps unnecessary but not racist! 

Lugo is a player we love to hate but if he was ever to play for Kitchee, or if he decides to play for Hong Kong representative team when he qualifies to do so in a couple of years, then i am sure we will support him as one of our own.  We for one, would love to see Lugo do for Kitchee would he did to Kitchee on Sunday.

Where next for Kitchee? 

After 4 games, Kitchee find themselves with only 6 points - having won 1 and drawn 3 - and are 6 points behind Southern who sit top (albeit having played one more game).   The Bluewaves are "on the road" for 6 of the last 9 matches of the season and so need to ensure that they take maximum points from their next three league games, all of which are at home, against Hoi King, Pegasus and Dreams in order to ensure that they stay in the title race.  The fact that they are currently unbeaten is not worth much if they don't start winning games and may soon be unable to catch up to Eastern and Southern, who have both started the season fantastically well. 

Next match: Senior Shield vs Dreams FC 
Mong Kok Stadium
14:30 kick off