Sao Tome see Red, Macau qualify for Semis
It was by no means easy, but Macau showed their steel to overcome Sao Tome and Principe 2-1 in dramatic circumstances to book their place against Goa-India in the semi finals at the Tilak Maiden on Thursday.
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Rodney Pinto Tagus was the villain for Sao Tome, as he brought down Ho Chi Fong in the box late on into added time to give Macau a penalty. Choi Weng Hou stepped up and scored from the spot to send Macau into the semis and in the process broke the Sao Tome hearts that put up a great fight.
Sao Tome Coach Osvaldo Lima had targeted semi finals qualification and his Young team will feel desperately unlucky to have lost out by the narrowest of margins.
In the 1st Half Sao Tome dominated the game but they failed to turn their dominance into goals. In fact it was Macau that broke the deadlock in the 45th minute through Ho Chi Fong. Kou ET Cheong floated a ball in to the box which was tapped in by Fong after a mix up between the keeper and Sao Tome defenders.
Sao Tome Coach Osvaldo Lima made a couple of substitutions at half time and brought in Ramiro Varela and Cadmo Pereira. The substitutions worked and it was all attack as Sao Tome went in search of the equalizer. In the 56th minute Cadmo Pereira played a delightful diagonal ball into the box which met by Sao Tome skipper Vando Neto whose glancing header found the back of the net to make it 1-1.
Sao Tome was dominating the match until the 77th minute when Fabio Junior Ramos was shown a second yellow to reduce Sao Tome to 10 players. Macau with a man advantage went in search of a winner but there was no way through the stubborn and motivated Sao Tome defence. However a moment of madness in the 90th minute by Gastao Patricio Basto reduced Sao Tome to 9 players when he was shown a red card for a kick on Macau midfielder Pang Chi Hang.
Macau went all out deep into stoppage time with Ho Chi Fong who got the ball and ran at blistering pace into the box. Rodney Tagus stuck out a leg to bring down Fong and the Indian referee Ranjit Bakshi had no hesitation to point to the dreaded spot. Goal scorer Choi Weng Hou stepped up to take responsibility sending the keeper the wrong way to score his second of the match what he described as the most important goal of his career.
In the post match conference Macau coach Leung Sui Wing said that it was a good game and anybody could have won it. I would say we were 50% lucky to win the match today. He also added that a 3 days break definitely helped them to regroup from the defeat at the hands of Sri Lanka. We now look forward to our clash with the Hosts Goa-India, he concluded.
