Wolverhampton Wanderers won the Premier League Next Generation Cup on Friday at the Reliance Corporate Park in Navi Mumbai after defeating Stellenbosch FC 5-4 in a penalty shootout.
Aaron Keto-Diyawada, a substitute, converted the game-winning penalty against Stellenbosch to give the English club the Reliance Foundation-sponsored championship.
After a scorching 70-minute contest in which the temperature reached 35 degrees Celsius, the game ended in a tedious 1-1 draw at the end of regulation time.
Harvey Griffith repeatedly knocked on the doors before heading a corner kick past a diving De Jean Ah-Shene five minutes before halftime, giving Wolves the lead despite not having the majority of possession in the first half. During practice, Wolves coach James Collins emphasized the value of set-piece scenarios, and the time invested on drills paid dividends.
“All week long, we’ve had success with set pieces. We don’t typically perform this well. But I must admit that Sean, my assistant, helped me instruct the guys using set-piece scenarios. Set pieces eventually win you or lose your matches, but it’s not the most enjoyable aspect of the game, observed Collins after the victory.
Wolves were deadly throughout the entire tournament, not just in the summit match. The orange team scored 11 goals and only let up one in the championship. “They (the players) started to lose patience with me. They’ve had a simple tournament, I emphasized, and I knew Stellenbosch would present a different threat in front of goal. Van Wyk, their forward, performed admirably throughout the competition. We gave them more possession than usual but had a counterattack in mind, which I’m delighted to say worked. Congratulations to our defense and goalkeeper Joe Young. Collins tacked on.
Though most of their attacks came from the left or right, the Stellies were precise on the flanks. As soon as they began pressing, Ethan Felix sent a low shot that Wolves goalkeeper Joe Young easily deflected off. This was their first shot on goal after five minutes.
Shortly after the game restarted following the break, the South African team equalized when star forward Antonio van Wyk scored a stunning goal in the 47th minute. But in the end, it was insufficient.
Evangelos Vellios, the coach of Stellenbosch, was all praise for the young players and claimed that even though his team couldn’t defend its championship, there was still a lot it could learn from the competition. We are a five-year-old South African club. We won’t let the penalty shootout obscure what we’ve accomplished. We are very proud of what we’ve accomplished, and it’s absolutely fantastic,” he remarked.
