Futsal Planet

Slovenia vs Albania

OFFICIAL MATCH REPORT

by Damon Shaw

Slovenia had to be patient to break down a stubborn Albanian side, who set their stall out not to concede. In the end Slovenia were too strong for their UEFA counterparts and will be happy to get off to a winning start. Albania were limited to long range efforts, several coming from their goalkeeper and couldn’t keep out a young Slovenia team led by Igor Osredkar for 40 minutes.

Albania clearly set out to defend from the off, but with Slovenia 62 places above them in the world rankings this can be expected and they did well keeping Slovenia out until the 14th minute when Kristjan Cujec scored a powerful shot from a corner kick. Albania would now have to come out of their shell and attack, if they wanted to get something out of the game, other than a low goal difference.
Slovenia pile on the pressure, knowing that Albania will not come at them and chances go begging; Sovdat guilty of missing a clear cut chance from inside the box after a good move. A timeout with a minute to go turned out to be a clever move by coach Dobovicnik as Slovenia had tripled their lead before the half-time interval.

Cujec scored a ten metre penalty before Igor Osredkar fired a shot into the top left corner. Cujec could have had one more from the second penalty mark, but he struck the bottom of the post from.
Albania would need to come out and attack in the second half if they wanted to get anything out the game, but all they seemed to want was to concede as few as possible. They did, however venture forward more often than in the first half, but rarely fashioned a chance of note. Still resorting to efforts from long range and barely troubling the goalkeeper.

Slovenia continued to control the game and a few chances came their way, with Osredkar and Fetic both hitting the woodwork. Gaj Rosic scored Slovenia’s first of the second half and it came from a beauty of a pass through the well organised defence. Rosic controlled and still had work to do to beat the ‘keeper, but he did so with his second touch and a touch of composure.

Futsal Planet most valuable player Igor Osredkar scored the fifth and final goal of the evening. He played an intricate pass into Rosic in the pivot position who bode his time and laid off his captain who finished unstoppably past the Albanian goalkeeper. He was happy with the win against a very difficult team.
“Today we played very good this is the first match of the tournament and we are preparing for the other games and i think we will play much better and today was most important to win,” he said.
“I think that we are a good team and we can play in the final.”

Posted by Luca Ranocchiari --> luca.ranocchiari@futsalplanet.com