© JumpStory
Last week, three matches were played in the Women's A League, after which the top of the tournament table was taken over by the former vice champions of recent seasons - the capital's "Žalgiris"-MRU. And if such a scenario was quite expected, the victories achieved in the other two matches by "Vilnius" and "Saned" can be called surprises.
Results of the 8th round matches:
FK Utenos Utenis 0:6 MFA Žalgiris-MRU | FIFA+ match recording | FIFA+ match summary
FK Banga 0:2 FK Vilnius | FIFA+ match recording | FIFA+ match summary
FK Saned 2:1 FC Hegelmann | FIFA+ match recording | FIFA+ match summary
Top. Before the match with "Utenos Utenis," the players of "Žalgiris"-MRU were one point behind the leader "Gintaras" in the tournament table but had played one game less. Vytautas Lukša's proteges knew that a victory against the young Utenos team would add a beautiful record to the club's history - winners of the first round.
And if there were any doubts before the first referee's whistle that things could end differently, it became clear after the start of the match that it was only a matter of time before the Vilnius women scored. Two minutes into the game, the first serious threat arose, and five minutes later - the second. Liana Ghazaryan successfully crossed from the right side, passing the ball to Aristella Atouth, who opened the scoring.
Eight minutes later, A. Atouth was again involved in a successful attack. This time she became the creator of the goal rather than the scorer. Rachel Hawkins doubled the lead with two strikes, thereby further relieving the team from the already low tension.
The Žalgiris players continued to press their opponents, but both from the third goal were saved by both the assistant referee's raised flag and the goalkeeper who cleared the ball from an empty goal. The Utenio players did well, but it must be noted that they deserved those successes for their hard work.
After the break, they simply ran out of steam, and the Žalgiris women capitalized on that fatigue with four additional goals. Ana Cheminava, A. Atouth, L. Ghazaryan, and Karilė Liužinaitė shared their thoughts.
First Victory. Last year, after stepping into the A League and quickly achieving their first victory, Joniškis' "Saned" club had to wait much longer for such success this year. The Joniškietes finally earned three points with their first attempt, defeating the heavily struggling Hegelmann team from Kaunas district.
The match started with a mistake from the Kaunas team, and Lukos Alwoeongo scored a goal in the 22nd second. In such a short time, "Saned" did not even have time to replace the goalkeeper, as is customary for this team, and thus take advantage of the set piece. However, after the goal, the procedure was done, Aušrinė Jankūnaitė was replaced by Teona Sukhashvili, and "Saned" continued with four Lithuanian players.
A defensive mistake cost them the second goal. In the middle of the penalty area, after a touch-of-pass and shot, the "Saned" players sent the ball into the net for the second time. At that time, not even ten minutes had passed.
From then on, essentially, only one team played on the field. Simona Petravičienė was particularly active in attack, significantly reducing the deficit with an impressive strike in the referee's added time of the first half. In the second half, "Hegelmann" was closer to equalizing than "Saned" to scoring the third goal, but the ball did not find the net more times.
Vytautas Paunksnio comments | Vanessa Vasiliauskaitė's comments
Revenge. Just as "Saned" avenged the Hegelmann team, FK "Vilnius" avenged Gargždai's "Banga." The "tigresses" who were recently leaders have now dropped to fourth place. What caused this? Undoubtedly, both a tougher schedule and Vitalija Žatkina's serious injury.
The match against the Vilnius women started actively for "Banga." Especially memorable was the early attack of the young Estela Tamošauskaitė at the beginning of the match. Unfortunately for "Banga," after snatching the ball into the penalty area, Estela had no more strength to shoot properly.
The first goal of the match was scored at the beginning of the second half. After Valerija Postol's shot, the ball hit the leg of the home team's defender and went into the goal. It was a bitter situation because "Vilnius" had many better chances to score before that.
Speaking of "Vilnius" Mia Darden must be highlighted, who had scored goals in three consecutive matches and contributed the most to the winning streak. This time, Mia also didn't leave the field without a goal. In the fourth minute of added time by the referee, she deceived the defender with a deceptive move, then the goalkeeper and sent the ball into the net.
