Taiwan national team manager Henry Vom on Sunday had a successful debut in charge of Taichung Futuro, winning 3-2 against league leaders Taipower with a goal deep in stoppage-time, which combined with the results from the other matches saw the gaps close at the top of the Taiwan Football Premier League table.
Besides the big win for Futuro, Hang Yuan edged Taitung 1-0, Taiwan Steel dominated National Taiwan University of Sport 4-1 and the Red Lions held Ming Chuan University to a 1-1 draw.
Vom took over Futuro after previous coach Toshiaki Imai returned home to Japan.
Photo courtesy of the CTFA
Imai, who also managed the national team in 2016, had done well with a string of wins early in the season as Futuro and Taipower traded places at the top of the table.
Sunday’s match was also a battle between Taiwan national team coaches, with Vom, who was appointed in February, taking on Taipower’s Chen Kuei-jen, who held the job from 2013 to 2016.
With Taiwan’s FIFA World Cup qualifiers having been suspended due to the COVID-19 pandemic and with the future still uncertain, Vom has doubled up on his duties, much the same as Chen when he led Taipower and the national team from 2015 to 2016.
Hosts Taipower took the lead when Lai Chih-hsuan fired home a low shot in the 12th minute at the National Stadium in Kaohsiung.
Futuro’s South Korean striker Joo Ik-seong equalized on the half-hour mark when his dummy bamboozled Taipower goalkeeper Chiu Yu-hung.
Joo then grabbed his second soon after halftime when he received the ball and advanced into the penalty area to beat Chiu once again.
Futuro looked to heading for the victory until Ko Yu-ting lashed home a long-range shot three minutes from time to tie the match 2-2.
Just as it looked as though both sides had settled for the draw, Futuro substitute Lee Cheng-yun, whom Vom had put on in the 82nd minute, latched onto a long pass and headed over Chiu for the winner.
The loss saw leader’s Taipower remain on 26 points from 12 games, while Futuro moved up to 24 points in second, ahead of Hang Yuan only on goals scored after forward Chou Yu-chieh netted the only goal of their game against Tatung in the 86th minute in New Taipei City.
Tatung remain fifth, two points behind Taiwan Steel, but having played an extra game.
National Taiwan University of Sport are sixth on 10 points, while Ming Chuan University with five points are seventh, ahead of the Red Lions on goal-difference.
ANFIELD BLUES: Kylian Mbappe arrived at Anfield on a run of 21 goals in 17 games, but he managed just three attempts in the match, none of them hitting the target Kylian Mbappe has been nearly unstoppable this season, but he hit a roadblock in their UEFA Champions League match at Anfield on Tuesday. For the second year running, the Real Madrid forward had a night to forget at Merseyside as Liverpool won 1-0. Mbappe looked a shadow of the player who has been tearing defenses apart all season. “We were lacking that threat in the final third,” said Madrid coach Xabi Alonso, without naming Mbappe individually. The FIFA World Cup winner for France rarely looked capable of finding a breakthrough against a Liverpool team who have been so defensively fragile for much of the
LOCAL SUCCESS: In the doubles, Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei and Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia defeated Italians Sara Errani and Jasmine Paolini in straight sets Elena Rybakina on Monday punched her ticket to the WTA Finals last four with an impressive 3-6, 6-1, 6-0 victory over second seed Iga Swiatek in round-robin play in Riyadh. After cruising past Amanda Anisimova in her opener on Saturday, Rybakina claimed her second win of the week to guarantee herself top spot in the Serena Williams Group. Anisimova on Monday rallied back from a set and a break down to triumph 4-6, 6-3, 6-2 in her all-American battle with seventh seed Madison Keys, who has been eliminated from the competition. “Madi was playing so well, it was quite a battle out there,”
Erling Haaland on Sunday scored twice to propel Manchester City up to second in the English Premier League with a 3-1 win over AFC Bournemouth. The Cherries started the day in second thanks to the longest unbeaten run in the English top flight, but Andoni Iraola’s side were undone by the scintillating form of the Norwegian striker, who took his tally to 13 Premier League goals in 10 games. Haaland’s relentless streak is maintaining City’s title challenge as they reduced the gap to leaders Arsenal back to six points and edged one point ahead of Liverpool, who they face at the weekend. “Important
For almost 30 minutes, Vitomir Maricic did not take a breath. Face down in a pool, surrounded by anxious onlookers, the Croatian freediver fought spasming pain to redefine what doctors thought was possible. When he finally surfaced, he had smashed the previous Guinness World Record for the longest breath-hold underwater by nearly five minutes. However, even with the help of pure oxygen before the attempt, it had pushed him to the limit. “Everything was difficult, just overwhelming,” Maricic, 40, told reporters, reflecting on the record-breaking day on June 14. “When I dive, I completely disconnect from everything, as if I’m not even there.
RSS