Line-up: Minne / Si M'Hammed - McGroin - Bernardo / Billiet - McGeehan - Agily - Novak - Donner / Costa - Eloranta

Shotgun: De Roeck / Alguacil Jimenez / Lebbink

A beautiful crisp January morning with sunny skies and frosty fingertips bode well for what was about to come in the early afternoon. A clash of the titans, derby-day, the rumble in the Rosières jungle, whatever you want to call it...The Irish were in town. Well, Irish by name only because I didn't see many Irish lads on the pitch. In fact, rumours were swirling that there was more Irish blood in the RBBFC first team than in the FC Irlande starting 11...Sic transit gloria mundi.

Days like these deserve something more than your average McGrath pre-match yada yada. And so it happened. After claiming that this was not revenge, our very own Confucius McGrath started claiming that Brazilian butterflies can cause spontaneous sandstorms in Tokyo and Typhoons in Tasmania. None of it was making sense to me at the time but it sure made my think about my life in general. He probably meant that if we played well it could result in lots of goals. Or something.

Our captain fantastic announced the line-up and we were ready to rumble! Tempo, controlled aggression and technique would certainly undo this lot.

I don't think we've ever had better starts to a huge match like this one. After about 50 seconds of playtime, Noah slipped a clever little through-ball to Donner who took it on himself to finish smartly and score our fastest ever goal?! 1-0 to the Brits! A great start to the game and the Irish were given a nice little jab early on. I have to mention that those first 50 seconds were probably Noahs best 50 seconds of the game. He then decided that it would be a great idea to single-handedly gift our enemy a penalty. Ball in our box, striker had his back to goal, nowhere to go but away from the target, Noah decides that he it's time for the almighty bushwhacker. Abssa's very own Mike Dean didn't hesitate for a second. Penalty nr 1. and Jean was sent the other way. 1-1. Gutted.

One can't say that this game was an exhibition of free-flowing football with slick passing moves. It was a proper derby with crunching tackles and sometimes uncontrolled aggression. The ref didn't help by deciding that this was also his time to shine and making sure that whatever momentum we could get was quickly stifled.

A poor clearance resulted in Billiet intercepting the ball on the right wing and bombing forward. Eloranta did brilliantly by dummying his marker and making sure the attack wasn't off-sided out. The cross wash smashed in hard and low allowing Costa for a simple tap-in. 2-1 and 4 goals in 3 for the Argentine. Well played son!

Then just on the brink of half-time, Irlande had probably their only moment of real quality in the game (not mentioning the cannonball from the halfway line that was incredibly well judged by Minne. No save needed. Keeper knows his goal) where they had some joy on the wing beating of couple of players and smartly slipping it to on of the attackers who finished well by lifting it over Jean. 2-2 and HT.

The message was clear. This game is there to be won. Controlled aggression, tempo and some pings here and there.

The 2nd half started just like the first one. RBB well on top and only a brilliant save from their goalie could prevent the 3-2. So unlucky. Should have scored that one.

A scramble in the box and a moment of madness from McGroin later, we conceded our 2 penalty. Luckily the lad hoofed it over the bar into row Z.

By now the game got uglier and the first 2 footed challenges and Lamarra-esque elbows were flying around.

A scramble in the box and a moment of brilliance from Billiet later, we were 3-2 up again. A belter straight into the top corner. Let's win this now lads!!

Never two without three...

A coming together of bodies on the edge of our area with the Irish attacker desperate to go down. Deano wasn't to be fooled by this one! 3rd penalty of the day for FC Irlande.

This time they didn't screw it up and the on-loan vet tucked it away. 3-3.

It would have been glorious if our search for the winner in the last 10 minutes would have paid off. It didn't. A change of formation, injection of fresh blood from the bench, 3 up top. It didn't matter :(

FT and 3-3.

Absolutely gutted by the result. This felt like a loss and we deserved better.

But like Richy said, let's take the ref out of the equation next week and hammer the Portuguese. Let's make sure they will never ever try to beat us to the title!

VAMOS!!!!

Reporter and MoM: Barbie aka Maart10 aka Billiet