PHOTO: Renny Harlan – Serbian White Eagles midfielder Nikola Timotijovic struck four times to lift his side to a 9-2 romp over Weston United, Toronto Falcons also had an easy 8-0 rout of Ooty Black Pearl and in a hotly contested opening game of three, Scarborough held on to a 2-1 early second half lead to win its seventh of the season defeating Dynamo Toronto, three games with an abundance of goals at the Paramount ground on Saturday, August 26.
Shaqueil Bradford opened the scoring for Scarborough at the 27th minute mark, helped by a deflection that found the net past Dynamo goalkeeper Ihor Vitiv and Scarborough took a 2-0 lead at 43 minutes with a goal by midfielder Jordan Web. Dynamo’s Mykola Temniuk cut the lead to 2-1 at the 47th minute and the outcome was in doubt until the final whistle, a 2-1 result in favour of Scarborough. Three late substitutes played an important role in maintaining the lead including a strong effort by Jaimie Grondola who was a member of the Chile under-20 national team that took third place in the 2007 World Cup played here in Canada.
Victory gave the east Toronto side a 7-2-1 record for 22 points in second place in the standings, while Dynamo Toronto slipped to fourth position with a 5-4-1 record for 16 points.
The Serbian White Eagles opening goal in the second game by Vladimir Strizovic came early just after kickoff and followed by Marko Stajic making it 2-0 at 17 minutes. Timotijovic entered the picture with his first goal at 32 minutes, his second goal at 60 minutes, the hat-trick at 70 minutes and goal number 4 was struck at the 80th minute mark.
Strizovic scored his second goal at the 22nd minute, Nikola Durkovic found the net past Weston United goalkeeper Marcel da Silva just before the break and midfielder Stefan Pejic found the net at the 35th minute mark to complete the Serbian White Eagles scoring. Weston United defender Edson Rivera scored his side’s first goal at 19 minutes and Pedro Ruso scored the team’s second goal at 39 minutes.
The 9-2 victory marks the sixth time of the 11 matches played this season that Serbian White Eagles has scored 4 or more goals, a marked turn of events from the goal-shy reputation for which the team was known during previous two campaigns. The 9-2 victory keeps Serbian White Eagles five points in front of Scarborough in the standings and the leading team now has a 9-2-0 WLT record. Weston United has a 1-8-2 record for 5 points and sixth in the table.
Midfielder Nemo Shelia struck a hat-trick to lead Toronto Falcons to its 8-0 trouncing of Ooty Black Pearl in the night cap match which was never in doubt following a 5-0 lead at the interval. Sviatoslav Dziadykevych opened the scoring at eight minutes and Shelia made it 2-0 two minutes later. Nazar Slobodian increased the lead to 3-0 at 15 minutes, Dziadykevych made it 4-0 at 36 minutes and Shelia struck his second goal at 45 minutes.
Shelia completed the hat-trick four minutes into the second half, and two late goals at 78 and 80 minutes were scored by Valentyn Makoviichuk, an 8-0 score at the final whistle.
Toronto Falcons improve to a 6-3-1 record for 19 points and moving into third position in the table, while Ooty Black Pearl have a 0-8-2 record for two points and seventh position in the standings.
The regular season will resume at the Mattamy Sports Park on Saturday, September 9 with a Weston vs Toronto Falcons 2pm opener of three matches, Dynamo Toronto vs Hamilton City is a 4 pm kickoff and Ooty Black Pearl vs Scarborough at 6.