Goalfest - 5th May 2008

The new Player-Manager team at Once Municipal Carlos Escalante and Mario Elías Guevara give instructions to their players during the hard fought 2-2 draw at Vista Hermosa. They have a lot of work ahead of them to avoid the drop.

These are notes and links mentioned in the FREE podcast subscribe direct with iTunes, listen direct here or check here for more details on how to listen. But remember to come back to this page to post comments and questions. A full transcript appears at the end of this post.

First Division Round 15 (of 18) (attendance - takings US$)
Alianza 2 - 1 Águila video (1,582 - $7,179)
Vista Hermosa 2 - 2 Once Municipal
Chalatenango 2 - 1 CD FAS (2,890 - $14,696)
L.A. Firpo 5 - 0 San Salvador video (2,233 - $10,857)
Isidro Metapán 2 - 1 Nejapa (1,479 - $6,098)

BBC World Service - "Football In The Holy City"
This fascinating documentary is from the Assignment program and can be found on that link, or subscribe to the BBC Radio Documentaries free podcasts, look for the title dated around 1st May 2008. It is by David Goldblatt the author of the incomparable "The Ball Is Round" - this essential book can be purchased by clicking on the links on the right - the picture for US customers the text link for UK.

Second Division Round Round 22 (final round)
Group A
Atl. Marte 4 - 3 Estudiantes
Santa Tecla F.C. 0 - 0 Curazao - Photo Album see Las Delicias!
Fte. Aguilar 2 - 3 Sonsonate
Juv. Indepte. 1 - 2 Marte Soya.
A.D. Municipal 2 - 2 Once Lobos
Arcense 3 - 4 Vendaval

Group B
At. Chaparras 3 - 2 Topiltzín
Platense 3 - 3 A.F.I.
Mpal. Limeño 3 - 3 Fte. Sn. Fco.
Tehuacán 1 - 2 Liberal
Aspirante 2 - 2 Liberal I.R.
A.D.I. 1 - 1 Atlético Balboa

2nd Div. Second Round:-
Atlético Marte v A.D.I
Juv. Indepte. v Liberal
A.F.I v Santa Tecla
Atlético Balbao v Marte Soya.

CONCACAF Champions Cup Final
Saprissa 1 - 1 Pachuca
Pachuca 2 - 1 Saprissa
Good luck to the "Tuzos" in Japan

Copa Libertadores 2008 Second Round:-
America 2 - Flamengo 4
Lánus 0 - Atlas 1 - great goal from the boy Marioni
(America finally win - very fortunate it was, too - and they still finished clear last)
Copa Libertadores results and fixtures

A Rare Chested Goal:-
Ginancarlos Maldonado (Venezuela) completes Mexican Champions Atlante's come back from 2-0 to earn a draw against Puebla (already thinking of next year's relegation battle) with a remarkable well controlled goal - finished with his chest. A genuine pechazo. See this goal, and some of his others.

Quiz Questions:-
1) What have Hungary, East Germany and Italy in common - check podcast for clues
2) Who sung last week's song - BlackComyn has it - Dame Gracie Fields singing Pass Shoot Goal
3) A question about World Cup managers - check the podcast to hear the question

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Below is a complete TRANSCRIPT of the Podcast:-

A goal-tastic weekend. 18 goals from 5 top flight games – 52 from 12 second division games: that’s over 4 goals per game, and of the 34 teams involved only THREE failed to score. Which game did I attend? A goal-less draw, of course. All the weekend’s details coming up on …. DT Football In El Salvador…..

Welcome to DT Football In El Salvador available free

In the first division this week the two bottom teams were confirmed and the top five fighting out the four semi final spots are closer than ever.

On Friday afternoon the two big names in trouble met at the Estadio Cuscatlan. Pablo Centrone, manager of Alianza, declared that he did not see this season as a failure. With the FIFA sanction still in place – they cannot contract new players until this summer – he simply planned to avoid a relegation battle, and winning this game would make them mathematically safe, although it was already likely they would drop.

For his part Aguila’s embattled manager Agustín Castillo has no excuse for their poor showing. Going into this game they had lost the three previous games, and conceded 11 goals. Castillo’s response was to hand 19 year old third choice keeper Benji Villalobos his debut.

It ought have been a nightmare start for him as a simply perfect cross from Mexican Albarrán was headed horribly badly by José “Chepo” Martinez. An embarrassing miss, but he made amends a couple of minutes later with a potent shot which beat the young keeper and gave an early lead to the hosts. Aguila have had many problems with conceding early goals, and the technical team has worked on hard on this – they must have been very depressed to see it come to nothing. By twenty minutes the game should have been over at 3-0; as it was Villalobos saved an Arturo Albarrán penalty – it was a nice height for the keeper, but a good save none the less.

I have rarely seen a better example of a team allowing their opponents in the game. On 40 minutes the Alianza keeper Drago Portillo rolled the ball to Julio Castro – he was not watching the ball and it hit the back of his heels and went to Nicolas “Nicogol” Muñoz. The Panamanian easily took it round the keeper, but here you could see how low confidence is now in the San Miguel team. Muñoz paused with an open goal in front of him, giving time for Victor Velásquez to slide in. As the striker went to go round him the defender put a foot in and withdrew it, but had shown enough for Muñoz to dive over it. I think Nicolas Muñoz really wants to be ashamed of himself instead of doing a smug dance after converting the penalty. A striker who looks for a penalty when he has an open goal should be embarrassed.

Alianza reacted immediately with Ramiro Carbello down the left. Benji Villalobos displayed his inexperience by showing Carbello too much of his inside post, where he shot strongly to regain the lead.

2-1 at half time, and despite Alianza’s best efforts to throw this game away they held on to this lead throughout a second half in which Águila played much better, but even with Velazquez receiving his second yellow in the 84^th minute they never really looked like scoring. Alianza 2 – Águila 1.

The top of the league was condensed together on Saturday afternoon in the Estadio Gregorio Martinez as Chalatenango beat FAS 2-1. The local team gave a great game and Honduran Franklin Webster confirmed his return with both goals. Manuel “El Black” Martinez, who has recently scored his 50^th goal in El Salvador, has never scored against FAS, but I don’t think he worried too much about that as his team won. On the other side Alejandro Bentos, one of the Argentineans who have been trying to take Salvadorian citizenship, had a miserable 30^th birthday, failing to score and losing to boot. This puts both of these teams on 25 points. Chalatenango 2 – FAS 1

The Honduran who IS now El Salvadorian, Williams Reyes, scored both goals as Nejapa lost 2-1 away to Metapán. This leaves his club joint top as well as him joint top in the goal scorers list, as Pablo Barroche also scored a brace. Goal keeper Miguel Montes scored for Nejapa, the promoted team this year who have relatively comfortably avoided a relegation battle. Isidro Metapán 2 – Nejapa 1.

Carlos Escalante, the creative midfielder at Once Municipal, has been appointed caretaker-player-manager just two weeks after passing his Class B trainers certificate. His assistant boss is the club captain Marío Elías Guevara. In the picture on dt el Salvador dot blog spot dot com their charges look quite bewildered by the instructions they are giving, but their first game in charge showed real character as they came back twice against high-flying Vista Hermosa to earn a draw. The manager set one up and scored the other to lead from the front. This is an important point for The Canaries, but I still feel it is too little too late. The have not won a game this season and are 6 points behind San Salvador with 3 games left. Escalante is highly confident that they can pull this back, and take the play-off spot and condemn San Sal to direct relegation. Certainly they showed more in this game, and next week’s game at home to San Salvador is a crucial time for them to start winning – a real six-pointer for both teams. Vista Hermosa 2 – Once Municipal 2.

For their part San Salvador are going through another really rough patch, without a win in six games. The first half away against champions Firpo was very even as the home side looked nervous and the visitors well organized. However deep into injury time in the first half Carlos Calderón scored and they went in at 1-0 up. This gave resurgence to the champions, who look bicampeonato material at the moment, and really demoralised the Panteras. The game ended an embarrassing 5-0 drubbing, Calderón getting another, Pekárnik one and Patricio “El Pato” Barroche a brace who, like Reyes, is joint top in hombre gol just as his team is joint top in the league.

So with three games left – on Wednesday and the next two weekends – the bottom two are decided, it will be Once Municipal & San Salvador. The Canaries are in the direct drop zone with 21 accumulated points, and The Panthers in the play-off spot with 27. It seems a lot of points to drag back, but they play each other Wednesday and San Salvador are in free fall.

At the other end Firpo and Metapán have 27 points each (goal differences of +13 and +10 respectively) and the next three have 25 points, that is Chalatenango on +7, FAS and Vista Hermosa both on +4. Below them Alianza and Águila have a small chance of making the semi’s but on 17 points each it seems unlikely. I still believe Vista Hermosa will miss out this year.

You are listening to DT Football In El Salvador available FREE from dt el Salvador dot blogspot dot com, after this break we have general football news, second division and YOUR posts…. Stay with us…

The BBC has produced an interesting radio documentary about the nasty core of hatred, intolerance and racism at the heart of Israeli football. The most damning quote is from a leading Israeli broadcaster saying that he does not like the racism - but it doesn’t bother him, as it is part of football. I don’t agree with that at all. The main thrust of this fascinating show is actually about how interlinked football and politics are – a fact only denied, I think, in the English speaking world. It is made by the author of that remarkable and essential book The Ball Is Round, David Goldblatt. Check here for how to download the documentary for free and links to buy the book.

Some remarkable games in the second division, as teams fought to avoid relegation. Chaparrastique won 3-2 over Topiltzin but it wasn’t enough to save them from the drop, as Once Lobos drew two all with AD Municipal, as did Liberal IR with Aspirante. The other team down there, Vendaval, had an amazing away game at Arcense finally running out 4-3 winners. Fredy Santos scored a hat-trick, his last late goal being the one that keeps them up.

At the other end, all four Group A second round positions were already decided, but four teams were battling out the final Group B position. The three games involving this four all ended in draws ADI 1 – Atlético Balboa 1, Aspirante 2 – Liberal IR 2 and Platense 3 – AFI 3. As ADI had one more point then the others, they make it to the second round. That final game was an interesting one as AFI were leading 3-1 with 10 minutes to go, then Carlos Ayala and Francisco Calderón scored on the 80^th and 84^th minute giving Platense some hope, but they couldn’t get the dramatic late winner, and so missed out.

Other results not mentioned already are in Group A Juventud Independiente 1 – Marte Soyapango 2, Fuerte Aguilares 2 – Sonsonate 3 and Atletico Marte 4 – Estudiantes 3... In group B Tehuacán 1 – Liberal 2 and Municipal Limeño 3 – Fuerte San Francisco 3.

All exciting stuff!! I went to Las Delicias to see Santa Tecla and Curazao play out a goalless draw. I took several photos of this International stadium. International because in 2006 it hosted a game in a four-way Under 17 competition. The game finished Mexico 1 – Columbia 1.

But back to today’s game, in which both teams rested a few first team players. It started brightly but the early missed sitter of a header by the home team was a sign of things to come. Santa Tecla clearly dominated the game as a whole, but the finishing was shocking. This was also true of their opponents who had probably the best move of the game – a wonderful slide rule pass threaded through the box requiring the striker to simply knock it past the keeper at the end of his perfectly timed run. He blasted over.

Santa Tecla’s best periods were at the beginning and the end, and as we have seen before with them being down a player does not faze them (a clearly bookable clumsy challenge getting a direct red – a sign of modern times) – in fact they ended the game much stronger than Curazao. Cesar Arce in midfield was once again my man of the match, a match that ended nil all but could, with only half decent finishing, have finished 8-3. Santa Tecla 0 – Curazao 0.

So now to the second round, the winners of Group A play the fourth placed team from Group B, second in Group A versus third in Group B, and so on. That means Santa Tecla face Group B leaders A.F.I, although second placed Atlético Balboa are probably the team to avoid. The full schedule is. Atlético Marte v A.D.I, Juventud. Independiente. v Liberal, A.F.I v Santa Tecla and Atlético Balbao v Marte Soyapango. After these ties there are semis and a final to find this half season’s Second Division champions.

A quick look at your posts, now. Thanks again to anon and Nico, from Plantain Football, neither of who got either of the quiz questions. Black Comyn, however, was bang right about the song, sung by Rochdale’s own Gracie Fields, the highest paid Hollywood star in her day. Well done to him. He has trouble with the original question though, despite enlisting the help of “half of Scotland”. I think the problem is that our Scottish friends believe the World Cup to a two-week affair – there is life after the group stages, you know. So another clue to this question, which is “What have Hungary, East Germany & Italy got in common?”. It is a World Cup question, something those three countries have done that no others have. And today’s clue is: - 1954, 1974 and 1978. As always post your answers, and any other comments or questions. All welcome.

Finally I have a few things from Mexican football that caught my eye, and this week’s quiz question ….

So congratulations to the Tuzos of Pachuca, once again champions of CONCACAF after a comfortable 2-1 victory over Jorge Vergara’s Saprissa of Costa Rica. It was a lot more comfortable than it sounds 3-2 on aggregate. Pachuca will represent CONCACAF in Japan this December, and I hope they give a better account of the region than they did last year, although they are a poorer team than this time 12 months ago, but maybe the experience of last year will benefit them, I wish them luck.

Mexican clubs also compete in the South American Copa Libertadores as invitees. It has just entered it’s second round, the round of 16. America have just got their first win in 12 games in the League, a very fortuitous 1-0 victory over Monterrey, but before that they entertained Flamengo of Rio de Janeiro, and it looked like heading for a 2-2 draw. Not a bad result as this competition has no away goal rule. However they contrived to concede not one but two goals in injury time. Taking a 4-2 deficit to Rio I see no way back for them.

Meanwhile in Argentina Atlas got a good 1-0 away win, courtesy of a very cheeky finish by that man Bruno Marioni. I advise you check the video, well worth a look.

Another remarkable goal - this time in the final round of League games in Mexico, Venezuelan Giancarlo Maldonado scoring a beauty of an equaliser – with his chest, once again there is a link to a video on the blog.

That’s it for this week, thanks for listening and the next round of games here are midweek – Aguila and Alianza need to beat Chalatenango and Firpo respectively to keep their slim hopes of qualification alive. Also slim are Once Municipal’s chances of overcoming the six points they are behind San Salvador, they have a great chance as they meet in this round. Vista Hermosa need to show their metal against Nejapa and the top of the table clash FAS v Metapán completes a mouthwatering jornada of football salvadoreño ….

Join me next week on DT Football In Salvador to hear all about it, but not until you have answered this week’s questions….the latest is: - Who is the only man to have managed four different countries to the second round of the World Cup ….