Skonto Stadium – wonderful atmosphere. Two teams – one fighting for the 2023 title against the 2022 Optibet Virsliga champions. Round 27 on Saturday night brought football magic, and action on every possible level. In this unyielding battle, the Valmiera FC team failed to overcome the opponents’ pressure and suffered a 0:3 loss.
Jurgis Kalns made some changes to this game. Klavs Lauva entered the goal, and Niks Dusalijevs, who was entrusted with the work of attack, went on the pitch for the first time since May, together with the Senegalese duo, Meissa Diop and Alioune Ndoye.
The game started with a bang, first an attack on the players of Valmiera FC, which was quickly answered by the team of Riga FC. As the match progressed, the home team struggled to gain control of the ball and then the back-and-forth began. One plays with the ball and tries to create moments, while the other catches and builds counterattacks.
In the first half, the team from the capital city had five corner kicks, all of which were completely unsuccessful, unable to cope with the excellent defense of the Vidzeme team. The pressure was high, Milos Jojic found a teammate with a lightning play from a throw-in, who fixed the ball to Brian Pena – a shot without stopping the ball and into the goal guarded by Lauva.
For the second half, Valmiera FC came out energized and ready to turn the tide, At first it was successful, but as time went by, Riga decided that turning the tide would be their task – an emergency situation in the 77th minute. The opponent’s player with his back to the goal, but was still accurate, correcting a teammate’s long shot, and the result was already 0:2.
Hell’s gates opened just a few minutes later – Antoni Contreras made a flight down the left side, then received the ball and flicked the ball over Klavs Lauva. The final result of the game was found, but nothing ended there. After the conceded goal, Ndoye lost his temper and decided to grossly violate the rules of the game and received a straight red card.
This game took a long time, in one of the episodes the referee went to watch the replay of VAR to understand whether a penalty kick should be awarded to Valmiera’s goal or not. Fortunately, it was not granted, the opportunity to breathe, but the compensation time was quite long – 10 minutes. At this time, the visitors were looking for an honorable goal, There were chances, but they were also unsuccessful, so the duel ended in a sad mood.
We will play our next game a week later – on September 2nd when we will open the doors to the final stage of the Optibet Virsliga at Jana Dalina Stadium. Our opponent will be the FK RFS team, the game starts at 14:00.
