November 2, 2004

A fuming Lions' coach, Radojko Avramovic blasted the national team finishing after a last-minute Amri Yahyah goal earned Malaysia Selection an unlikely come-from-behind 2-1 win over Singapore Selection in a friendly match at the Jalan Besar Stadium.

For Raddy it was a case of us defeating ourselves as he was disappointed with the final outcome as he felt we would have won easily if we had taken our chances.

Also he added we were still giving away too many balls & lacking concentration & we cannot get good results with that.

How different it all looked when Itimi Dickson gave Singapore the lead with a wonder strike after 21 minutes. The 20-year-old moved in from the left wing to the edge of the penalty area, before expertly wrapping his right foot round the ball to send a swerving shot past the flailing arms of Malaysian goalkeeper Mohd Syamsuri Mustaffa sparking wild celebrations among the Singapore fans.

After that Singapore had numerous opportunities to extend their lead but chances after chances were wasted & it was this kind of finishing that angered the National coach.

Both sides then made substitutions in the second half & it affected Singapore more as Malaysia substitute striker Khalid Jamlus fire home after the Singapore defence had failed to deal with Indra Putra Mahayuddin’s cross. After the equalizer, the match appeared headed for a draw but a sucker punch was thrown in the final moment by Malaysia when Chan Wing Hong centre the ball for Amri to smash in the winning goal.

It left Singapore ruing the countless missed scoring chances, in a match they should have won by half-time.