FT: Finland 3-2 Faroe Islands
<pre class="ip-ubbcode-code-pre">Tainio 50 K. Mortensen 10Mäkelä 78, 88 K. Nielsen 48</pre>
This was a truly fantastic performance from the Faroe Islands, the like of which the fans from this small nation have not seen for many a year. Forget, for a moment, the cruel final scoreline - no-one who was there could have denied that the Faroes deserved a point from this game - the performance from this team was truly inspired. Finland may be bottom of their group, but with vastly experienced and highly skilled players such as Hannu Tihinen, Petri Pasanen and Mikael Forssell, they are clearly a level above the lowest rung of European teams containing the Faroe Islands. The bare final statistics show that the Faroes conceded 3 goals and took 0 points from this qualifying match, but dig a little deeper and you find a team who managed to create 14 efforts on goal throughout this match,
away from home, 11 of them on target, a team whose passing was at times insightful and incisive, cutting through the Finnish defence, a team who crossed well, tackled well and competed well for all their headers. Ultimately perhaps their fitness was what was telling - most of the squad play their football in the Faroe Islands league and are lacking in match fitness, but they can take great pride from this brave and gutsy performance.
It was in the 10th minute that the Faroe Islands won their 1st corner of the game, taken by
Magni Joensen and headed in superbly at the near post by centre-back
Kári Mortensen to give the away team a shock lead. In an eventful first half, both sides poured forward with some great attacking moves without a great deal of focus of defensive play yet as half time came, the Faroese goal held firm as the island side headed in 0-1 up at the break. The second half began in explosive fashion, just 3 minutes in as the Finnish defence failed to deal with a Faroese throw-in, the ball found
Rúni Poulson and the striker's shot was spilled by Peter Enckelman who failed to react quick enough to stop
Kristian Nielsen following in to put the small away following into raptures as their side extended their surprise lead to 0-2. The Faroese have not won an away match in over 10 years, but today they were really looking like a confident team capable of ending that long barren run. Unfortunately, whilst the attacking play was refreshingly slick and creative, the defending was looking less and less steadyand having pummelled various shots at the away goal, Finland finally made the breakthrough on 50 minutes as Savolainen crossed for Teemu Tainio to fire home the goal to give the Finns hope of avoiding embarrassment.
With the match heading into the final 15 minutes the Faroese were not only holding on, but matching their more illustrious opponents shot for shot and pass for pass as their fans looked constantly at their watches, willing the hands to tick round the next 15 minutes as fast as possible. On 78 minutes however, Finnish persistance paid off as Mikael Forssell fired the ball across the box,
Peterson got a glove to it to clear as far as Okkonen who's neat chip was just about palmed away again by
Peterson, but Juho Mäkelä was onhand and couldn't miss to make it 2-2. The Faroese players were clearly hugely disappointed, but to their credit they continued pushing on and competing strongly, looking for a winner and were finishing the stronger team with multiple efforts on goal in the last 10 minutes spurned before heartbreak 2 minutes from time as substitute Jussi Kujala crossed for Juho Mäkelä to volley home a brilliant finish. The Faroes piled forward and created 2 further efforts on goal, but come the final whistle it was another defeat, the Finns knew they had been pushed hard and were lucky, but in the end they had the 3 points that mattered.
Speaking after the match, Faroese manager Adam Eckersley was keen to stress the positives after admitting his team's defending cost them the game. Eckersley said he was delighted with his side's best attacking performance by a long way since he took over, creating far more chances than in the first 3 games put together and looking like they could score with almost every attack. Commenting on the first 4 group games as a whole Eckersley was again in upbeat mood: "No-one expected us to get anything against Germany and the 1-1 draw was a fantastic result for us, the defeat in Macedonia was disappointing, but fully expected - we know that it is at home really that we are most likely to have a chance at any points. Maybe after the Germany result some people thought we would beat Lithuania, but they are a top 100 ranked side and a draw was again a very creditable result. As for tonight, what can I say? Everyone who was here knows we deserved a point - we didn't deserve the win because we didn't defend well enough and you have to give credit to Finland for taking enough of their chances, but we can take a lot from this performance.
[This message was edited by glamdring on 26 March 2004 at 22:15.]
Time to report on the game now before the irritation becomes too much again :p
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