Kitchee’s Premier League Title Hopes Suffered Blow

Competing in its third game within seven days, Kitchee could only draw Glory Sky Wong Tai Sin 0:0 on Saturday afternoon’s BOCG Life Hong Kong Premier League away fixture, dropping points in two consecutive premier league games, taking a severe dent in its title hope. Kitchee controlled the first-half for the better part and came close to notching the opening goal in the early stage. Unfortunately, striker Jorge Tarres saw his tight-angle shot drifted wide across the goal-mouth and went out of play. Glory Sky Wong Tai Sin almost took a surprising lead before the half-time interval, when Yuto Nakamura connected with a teammate’s cross and dished out an acrobatic shot that just missed hitting the target. Kitchee turned it up a notch in the second-half and generated chance after chance, with the double-threat from Lo Kwan-yee and Jorge Tarres particularly dangerous. However, Glory Sky Wong Tai Sin keeper Tsang Man-fai was very sharp on the day and turned away Kitchee attackers time and time again, securing a 0:0 draw for his side against Kitchee. Kitchee midfielder Lam Ka-wai admitted the club’s chances of retaining the premier league trophy had taken a dent after the goalless draw. “We cannot be using the ground as an excuse every time, as other teams face the same match conditions. However, every premier league side seems to have a legitimate chance of beating each other this season and even the mid-to-bottom teams can nick points off the front-runners. There is still a long way to go in the season, thus I am not going to count ourselves out in the premier league title-run,” Lam insisted. Striker Juan Belencoso pointed out that Kitchee had created numerous chances during the match and bad luck was the main reason to the team’s failure to secure the winning goal. “Glory Sky Wong Tai Sin focused most of the game on defense, making it very difficult for us from an attacking standpoint. However, we did create lots of scoring chances and it was bad luck that prevented us from finding the back of the net. We have only played five premier league games so far and I am not going to lose faith in our premier league title hopes,” maintained the Spanish target man.