Written by: Shawn Lim

Balestier Khalsa halted their dreadful run of results in the Great Eastern-Yeo’s S.League as they defeated Home United 3-1 at Bishan Stadium on Tuesday night to pick up their second win of the season.

The hosts, missing key striker Ken Ilso through injury, struggled to carve out chances for themselves, but a great chance to break the deadlock in the 16th minute when Song Uiyoung dazzled his way to the byline, but saw his cross easily caught by Tigers custodian Zaiful Nizam.

Balestier had two golden opportunities to open the scoring themselves in space of a minute when Shah Hirul blasted Fadhil Noh’s layoff just wide in the 27th minute, before the former’s shot rocked the woodwork after Home custodian Zulfairuz Rudy’s goal-kick had gone straight to him.

The visitors managed to find the breakthrough on the stroke of half-time when Miroslav Kristic’s cut-back at the byline found an unmarked Zulkiffli Hassim at the far post and the winger slammed the ball home.

The Protectors begin the second period on the front foot and pulled level in the 53rd minute when Faris Ramli latched on to a brilliant defence-splitting pass from the halfway line by Ambroise Begue and slotted the ball home.

Home’s joy at finding the equaliser was short lived though, when a beauty of a strike from substitute Smajovic Sadin outside the box found the bottom corner of the net to put the Tigers ahead again in the 66th minute.

The Tigers could have added a third two minutes later, but Fadhil Noh saw his effort clawed away by Zulfairuz, before slashing his rebound over the crossbar.

Home’s night got even worse in the 75th minute when another Tigers’ substitute Jamil Ali, headed home Tokic’s cross at the far post barely a minute after coming on to make it 3-1 to his team.

The game was well and truly over for the Protectors two minutes later when substitute Sufianto Salleh was shown a straight red card for dangerous play as the Tigers hung on for the long-awaited three points.

Home United assistant coach Robin Chitrakar: “We were not good enough, we conceded very soft goals and we definitely can do much better than this.

“Of course we missed Ken (Ilso), but the team knows how to deal with that so ultimately, it was still a poor team performance. We will definitely rectify it in the next training.”

Balestier Khalsa coach Marko Kraljevic: “I think we played well, the boys were working very hard as usual. You can see from the last game, we are getting better and better with this one striker who is able to hold the ball up for us.”

Home United: Zulfairuz Rudy (GK), Sirina Camara (Sufianto Salleh 46′), Sim Teck Yi, Abdil Qaiyyim, Song Uiyoung, Shamil Sharif, Zulfahmi Arifin (Mahathir Azeman 88′), Azhar Sairudin (C), Faris Ramli, Ambroise Begue (Amir Zalani 78′), Khairul Nizam

Balestier Khalsa: Zaiful Nizam (GK) (C), Fadli Kamis, Hanafi Salleh, Nurullah Hussein, Sheikh Abdul Hadi, Shah Hirul (Danial Tan Farhan 33′), Fazli Ayob, Zulkiffli Hassim (Smajovic Sadin 59′), Fadhil Noh (Jamil Ali 74′), Miroslav Kristic, Niko Tokic