Second half blitz ensures Kitchee leave Aberdeen with all three points- Southern 1 Kitchee 3

Kitchee's strong start to the second half blew Southern away, and eventually ended 3-1 winners. A lacklustre first half saw fans frustrated, but goals from Juninho, Temirov and Law Tsz-chun put Kitchee miles ahead, before a penalty with the last kick handed Southern a consolation.

Team news

Three of Kitchee's four Hong Kong starters returned to the starting lineup; Leon Jones, Juninho and Fernando, bu after playing 180 minutes for Hong Kong, Ngan Cheuk-pan was named on the bench, allowing Jay Haddow to continue in holding midfield. Fynn Talley also returned to the starting lineup after the Sapling Cup, with Helio and Tuscany dropping to the bench and youngsters Cheung Yiu-hin and Li Siu-hin returning to the youth teams. Poon Pui-hin was left out of the squad; in just over a year the forward has gone from scoring against China for Hong Kong to being left out of a league squad to play university football.

Talley; Law (Bae 71), Leon, Dantas, Jordan; Machado, Haddow (Ngan 71), Rey, Fernando (c) (Hin 87); Juninho (Lung 65), Temirov (Slattery 90)

Unused: Wang, Helio, Buddle, Tuscany, Jason

Match events

Southern started the first half strongly. After a long ball was not dealt with, Talley had to get down low to deny Acosta, and soon afterwards gathered Kawase's header from a corner. Jordan Lam's freekick was easily saved by Ivan Ng, before Temirov went close twice after good work from Machado. But these chances aside it was a very lacklustre first half, goalless as the teams came off the pitch. Much more was needed for the second half if Kitchee were going to come away with three points.

And change they did. A shift to a more direct style of play began to pay off, as Kitchee ditched the fancy tricks and flicks. In the first five minutes of the second half, Fernando and Jordan Lam combined down the left, and Fernando hit the post from range, with Juninho scoring the rebound. After Southern failed to clear their lines, Luis Machado missed an open goal, failing to capitalise on good work by Temirov. But cometh the hour, cometh the man; Jordan Lam's corner was expertly headed in by the Uzbek forward at the front post for his tenth goal of the season. Minutes later, good work again from Temirov and Machado saw Temirov turn provider, with Law Tsz-chun of all people tapping it in on the line. Fernando blazed over when a fourth goal looked on the cards, while Ivan Ng denied Temirov again after a long ball forward from Leon Jones. With the last kick of the game Southern got a soft penalty as Machado pushed Shu Sasaki; Kessi converted to deny Kitchee their clean sheet, but Kitchee still had their first win in four.

Fans feedback

Much-improved second half display ensured the result was never in doubt, and clearly something was said at half time to spark the team into life. The story of Kitchee's first half was too many fancy tricks and flicks that didn't come off, but the second half saw more directness, with Machado in particular being more straightforward. Temirov was outstanding, and moved onto 10 league goals and 13 in all comps, the Uzbek forward being a menace up top with his work rate and probably should have had two or three. Law Tsz-chun recovered from a shaky start to the game to look solid and pop up with a goal. After early Southern pressure, they offered minimal threat as the defence held firm, although Talley had to react quickly early on. They deserved the clean sheet, but the harsh penalty awarded prevented this. A solid team performance, and with six games left fans hope for a few more of these, even though the title is gone.

What's on

This week we play Saturday at 6pm again against North District. We won 5-0 in the same fixture just a few weeks ago, but North District have won both their games since then. The returns to full fitness for Ruslan Mingazow and Tan Chun-lok are expected in a few weeks, while Jay Haddow and Sherzod Temirov go into this game on four yellow cards, and will hope to stay out of the referee's notebook so as not to miss Lee Man away the week after.

Match highlights

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