TEN-MAN OMONOIA HOLD OFF KAIRAT

Omonoia opened their campaign to qualify for the UEFA Champions League for the first time in club history with a gutsy 1-0 win at home to Kairat Almaty from Kazakhstan, who qualified themselves last year. Panayiotis Andreou scored early and making that goal stand up became a lot more difficult when Loic Nego got sent off in his Omonoia debut late in the first half. Omonoia held strong, though, defending with a purpose, not even forcing Fabiano to be heroic in goal, and Omonoia hung on for the win, a win they can be proud of. They will take that advantage into next week’s return leg in Almaty.

Omonoia hosted Kairat Almaty at the Stadio GSP in Nicosia. The first chance fell to Andronikos Kakoullis, returning for his second tour of duty with Omonoia, but he put it wide. Nonetheless, the breakthrough wasn’t far behind. Kakoullis found Panayiotis Andreou after a broken play, he fired past Temirlan Anarbekov from the edge of the box, the quick release did the job and Omonoia were up 1-0 in the thirteenth minute.

Omonoia however would have to do it the hard way, new arrival Loic Nego slid out to try to get to a loose ball, but instead he missed it and brought down Oiva Jukkola. The Portuguese referee Gustavo Correia originally gave a yellow card, but VAR Andre Narciso intervened and it was upgraded to a red card, Omonoia to 10-men.

Kairat immediately had Omonoia pinned in their own end, but the Omonoia defense held strong, stopping that final pass at every turn, except for when Nikolas Panayiotou used his back heel to block a Jukkola shot that Fabiano may or may not have gotten to. It was enough to get Omonoia to halftime still up 1-0.

Halftime seemed to give Henning Berg the opportunity to better prepare for being down a man, because Omonoia looked a lot less frantic in defending, starting to frustrate Kairat. Then in a rare foray forward since Nego was sent off, Kakoullis made a steal in his own half and flew past a throng of yellow shirts, making it all the way to the Kairat box. Unfortunately the shot didn’t match the rest of the effort and he shanked it wide. Jaakko Oksanen unleashed a powerful strike from well out but Fabiano was ready for it and at full extension sprawled out to make the save.

Senou Coulibaly looked like maybe he would produce one of his patented European header goals, he had enough space on an Omonoia corner, but Anarbekov was right there to make the save. Kairat kept coming though, Edmilson got a header on a free kick, Fabiano made the save, then not long after Fabiano needed help from his left post to deny Azamat Tuyakbayev. One last chance fell to Tuyakbayev, he put it wide and Omonoia hung on for the 1-0 win.

Omonoia(Henning Berg): 40. Fabiano(GK, Captain), 77. Loic Nego, 5. Senou Coulibaly, 30. Nikolas Panayiotou, 29. Jure Balkovec, 14. Mateo Maric, 22. Muamer Tankovic(’36 27. Stefan Simic), 74. Panayiotis Andreou(’77 31. Ioannis Kousoulos), 11. Ewandro Costa, 7. Jaden Montnor(’46 21. Mihaili Mayambela), 9. Andronikos Kakoullis(’69 85. Angelos Neophytou)

Kairat Almaty(Rafael Urazbakhtin): 1. Temirlan Anarbekov(GK), 3. Luis Mata(’83 17. Azamat Tuyakbayev), 44. Lucas Africo, 14. Aleksandr Martynovich(Captain), 20. Yorkin Tapalov(’58 81. Ismail Bekbolat), 13. Jaakko Oksanen, 6. Adilet Sadybekov(’46 9. Edmilson), 19. Oiva Jukkola(69 5. Lev Kurgin), 7. Jorginho, 24. Alexandr Mrynskiy, 28. Marc Gual(’83 22. Gustavo Mendonca)

Andrew Mantzas

Twitter: @MantzasSport