Lions finally beaten!

On a night our Lions would rather forget, we went down 2-7 against YPOM in our controversial third meeting this season.

The Lions controversially met YPOM after a reshuffle of the fixture, which saw our Lions face their rivals for the third time even though they do not line up against El Bola Fondalez this season. G.Stojanovski was recently ruled out for the season, M.Paunkoski failed a late fitness test and S.Stankovski is 1 week away from returning after picking up an ankle injury 3 weeks ago. A major late exclusion saw D.Paunkoski ruled out for the match after straining his left hamstring in Saturday's Victorian State 4 Seniors match for Plenty Valley Lions FC against RMIT in which they lost 2-1. This saw V.Todorovski, T.Paunkoski and C.Nastevski all come in as replacements alongside H.Karevski, A.Petrovski, D.Jovanovski and the returning A.Nikoloski.

The Lions began the game once again on the backfoot, looking like the are making a habit of conceding early goals and having to fight back from the get go. However, the first half score did not reflect that of the game. The Lions dominated in the front third but it just wasn't their day, going down 3-0 to defensive errors and lapses in concentration. Although nothing seemed to go our way, our boys did not stop fighting and this eventually led to D.Jovanovski scoring his only goal for the night reducing the deficit to 2 goals as both teams went to the benches at half time.

The Lions began the second half where they left off, dominating the front third peppering the opponents goal, leading to C.Nastevski further reducing the deficit with a brilliantly placed finish. The scores were locked in at 2-3 for at least 7 minutes with the Lions being very unfortunate not to score. Karevski's shots were blocked, Nastevski was not having any luck in front of goal, A.Nikoloski looked like he couldn't buy a goal, nothing was going in at all and it remained that way with the YPOM keeper saving everything that came his way with a man of the match performance. With luck on their side, YPOM went on to score a further 4 goals and it was very evident with the type of goals they were that is just wasn't going to be our night.

Our Lions lost their first game of the season, ending their streak at 10 wins in a row, however a major shoutout goes to every single player who played for the badge and fought right to the very end even when nothing was going our way. Well done boys, unfortunate results however we keep moving forward. Samo Napred!

Round 11 Squad:

33. Alexandar PETROVSKI (GK)

2. Tomce PAUNKOSKI

7. David JOVANOVSKI

9. Aleksandar NIKOLOSKI

23. Christian NASTEVSKI

27. Hristijan KAREVSKI

39. Vladimir TODOROVSKI

Goalscorers:

1 - David JOVANOVSKI

1 - Christian NASTEVSKI