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On Tuesday, "Tauras" welcomed guests from Vilnius - REO team at the "Vytautas" stadium in Tauragė. Although both teams had opportunities in intense matches, luck smiled more to the people of Tauragė, who took advantage of their chances and won with a "dry" result of 2:0.
In the first half, the game of the teams was equal, opportunities created could not be realized by either the hosts or the visitors from Vilnius. In the ranks of "Tauras," Romanas Kuzinas and defender Robertas Freidgeimas had opportunities to score.
Nevertheless, the people of Tauragė broke through in the 65th minute: Alessandro Mascia intercepted the ball in the opponents' half and passed it to Simonas Babilius, who, in the REO penalty area, dribbled past several defenders, and the ball struck one of their hands. Alessandro Mascia successfully executed the awarded penalty from 11 meters, scoring his second goal of the season (by the way, the first was also scored in a match against Vilnius REO, in the 4th round). After this episode, "Tauras" players retreated a bit and chose a counterattacking tactic, which paid off: in the 81st minute, Vladas Petkevičius secured "Tauras" lead after receiving a long pass from Aleksandrs Solovjovs, running alone against REO goalkeeper Valdas Jakimavičius and placing the ball over him - 2:0.
After the match, "Tauras" head coach Giovanni Scanu praised the team's enthusiasm and character shown: "Today we achieved a difficult victory. It is very difficult to play when you cannot properly rotate the players. Because of an injury, we had to replace Mantas Lėkys in the 10th minute, defender Tomas Rimas is not in the best form. I am pleased that we have many young players showing progress, and the team showed fighting spirit today. I am happy with the victory. Now we will have three days off, so finally, after a five-month break, I will return briefly to Italy."
The author of the second goal, defender V. Petkevičius, emphasized the greater desire to win as the main reason for the victory: "In the first half, we played quite rough, collecting yellow cards. Although REO had an experienced coach Valdas Ivanauskas, who should have had a psychological advantage, I think we proved that we wanted to win more. After the first goal, REO started to attack more, so coach G. Scanu replaced our forward S. Babilius, told the team to retreat, and placed me upfront, hoping to catch them on the counterattacks - and it happened."
After the third victory this season, Tauragė's "Tauras" climbed to the eighth position in the table of the "A League" with 10 points, pushing out today's opponent - Vilnius REO.
