3 points home from Thisted
AB Gladsaxe had to make the long bus trip to Thisted today. The squad had to arrive at 7:00 am so that the bus could arrive for the match against Thisted FC at 14:00. It’s tough conditions, but that’s how it is. AB has had a very difficult week both mentally and physically, and it was a team with slightly flat batteries that made the trip to North Jutland. Lucas Koch and Alessio Alicino were quarantined, Mican Atici had to stay home due to illness and several of the players on the bus suffered minor injuries after the week’s tough program.Thisted FC had several great chances, including two free-kicks, and a finish close to goal was shot past the goal. FC Thisted FC went 1-0 up after 25 minutes, and it was hard to see where AB’s goal would come from. AB was far back on the pitch and tried to take the pace out of the match with many passes. It was with Thisted’s lead that the players went into the break. Silas Trier Madsen was substituted at half-time and replaced by Adnan Curovic, who took his place in the back line and Marcus Mustac Gudmann was moved up to midfield. Emil Mygind came on after 56 min. and replaced James Iheme. 20 min. into the second half, Emil Mygind equalized 1-1 on a really good shot. It was Marcus Mustac Gudmann who scored the opening goal behind Thisted’s goalkeeper to make it 2-1 after 76 minutes. FC Thisted pressed on, and a finish ended up in the side netting after 91 minutes. The score remained the same throughout the match and it was a group of very happy, tired and satisfied players and coaching staff who could cheer in the dressing room. After the match, the players chose Tobis Brogaard as player of the match after he had played an excellent match with several match-deciding goals on several of Thisted’s finishes. There were several good performances between the bravely fighting ABs. Not least Marcus Mustac Gudmann played really well first in defense, later in midfield and finally he spiced up the effort with a great goal. After the match, head coach Patrick Birch Braune said: “Three really nice points here in Thisted. It was easy to see that there were some cup hangovers that we had to get over in the first half. There were far too many personal errors. Some lapses in concentration that showed we weren’t where we needed to be. We have a small squad today. The fact that we stepped up in the second half is fantastic. We go into the break looking each other in the eye and saying: “This is going to be really difficult – we have to go through a lot of pain, we have to suffer and then we win 2-1″. It takes a lot of heart. It was never a game of finesse, but it was a game with a lot of heart and that was our strength. We knew it was going to be difficult after a midweek game. We’ve played three games in six days and then we come up here and get three points today. It’s outstanding and huge credit to the players. We wanted to meet Thisted FC as high as possible and let them play and then take the ball ourselves in periods and take the tempo out of the match. If we could control the tempo of the match, it was good. Because we knew that physically we had some catching up to do against a Thisted FC that hadn’t played a midweek game. We didn’t have many players to play with today, so we could control the pace of the match and control how hard the match would be. But then it was stupid to go behind – but it went very well anyway”. Captain Silas Trier Madsen said this: “It’s one of those wins where you think, it’s not pretty. But it was fought back. You stand here afterwards with a super cool feeling. We just worked our asses off and got the three points. It wasn’t the prettiest football match or the most polished game. You could feel that we were affected by playing a lot of games. But it was a great effort by the boys that we were able to win the game”. Starting line-up with substitutions: 3 Gustav Overgård Hansen 4 Anton Basbas Pedersen 7 Frederik Ellegaard 8 Emil Wass out – Marcus Hørbye in 11 Oliver Angus out – 18 Mads Vang in 17 Christoffer Thrane 19 Albert Nørager out – 26 Christian Espensen Troelsen 22 Silas Trier Madsen out – 5 Adnan Curovic in 24 James Iheme out – 9 Emil Mygind in 25 Tobias Brogaard (goal) 30 Marcus Mustac Gudmann Next match is against FREM on Saturday, October 22 at 14.00 on artificial turf in Valby Idrætspark. If you want to join AB Forever’s Party bus trip to Valby, visit www.abforever.dk
