Tamale, May 28, GNA - Real Tamale United (RTU) once again failed to snatch the three maximum points in the 21st Week Onetouch mid-week Premier league encounter when visiting Tema Youth held them at home to spilt the points with a two-two drawn game at the Tamale Sports Stadium on Wednesday.
The outcome of the match suggested that RTU had not fully recovered from the four-zero defeat they suffered at the hands of visiting Kpando Heart of Lions in their outstanding match played last Sunday at the same venue.
RTU had all the opportunity to snatch the three maximum points from the visitors but ill luck, lack of enthusiasm on the part of some of the players caused their poor performance on the day and may suggest that all is still not well with the management of the team after the last Sunday's disaster that led to the resignation of two Board Members. The 'Pride of the North' opened scoring as early as the sixth minute through Alhassan Weah who neatly converted a free-kick, which goalkeeper Ernest Sowah of Tema Youth had no answer to register the first goal. The early goal gave the home supporters some ray of hope that RTU was in for vengeance and to prove to the fans that the heavy defeat suffered at the week-end was not going to affect them, they however failed to capitalize on their advantage.
After the early goal, the RTU lads made several attempts to increase their goal tally but class one referee, Yao Amatepey, unprofessionally denied RTU several obvious penalties, which seemed to demoralise and frustrate them in efforts with the players loosing concentration later that they later paid dearly for. Nana Eshun cancelled the lead in the 30th minute with a header from the right wing, with Najawu Issah in goal for RTU failing to prevent from entering his net. The game from then on became like a dog and rabbit affair as with a little touch on the ball from any of the sides' towards each others goal drives the opponent on a chase to prevent each other from scoring. Both sides could not increase the lead until the referee whistled to end the first half with a goal apiece. After the resumption, it was again RTU who were on the offensive as they probedg for more goals but lacked the experience and finishing power to convert their chances into goals. The visitors silenced the partisan home fans in the 60th minute when the RTU defencemen committed a defensive blunder as they lost the ball to a lurking Nana Eshun who made no mistake to score the second goal both for his side. The home team from then on sat on tender hooks and were lucky not to concede more goals as the Tema Youth lads were almost always on the offensive to beat the offside traps but they also could not utilise their chances.
RTU's skilful diminutive player Abdul Salam Alhassan came to rescue of his side when he fetched the equalizer in a neat fashion in the 64th minute when a powerful strike from the RTU attack was parried away by substitute goalkeeper Isaac Akong but Salam Alhassan was quick to react by heading the ball into the net for the much awaited equaliser to redeem the home from further shame. Several scoring chances was created by RTU as well as an obvious penalty when Salam was fouled in the Tema Youth 18 box but the referee once again ignored it, and it nearly marred the beauty of the game until the final whistle went for the end of proceedings.
