FK Csíkszereda earned their first away point in the Superliga and also kept a clean sheet in a top-flight match – these are the positives from Saturday’s game against UTA.

FK Csíkszereda earned their first away point in the Superliga and also kept a clean sheet in a top-flight match – these are the positives from Saturday’s game against UTA.

The negative side, however, is that we couldn’t manage to win, even though Róbert Ilyés’ team played more than half the match with a man advantage. That explains the possession and territorial dominance, the higher number of shots and passes – only the goal was missing for us to truly enjoy a fine football afternoon in Arad.

The hosts started the game better, the first ten minutes bringing dangerous attacks from UTA, but fortunately we managed to clear or their forwards lacked precision. In the 25th minute, Bakos could have given us the lead, but his long-range effort narrowly missed the target. In the 33rd minute, Anderson dribbled well into the box, his shot towards the right corner being brilliantly saved by Iliev, and we also survived the dangerous counterattack that followed. In the 30th minute, Coman received his first yellow card, and just four minutes later he should have been booked again when he elbowed Palmeș in the face, but the referee let him off. In the 43rd minute came the moment that changed the course of the game: first the hosts protested for a penalty after a wrestling-like duel between Palmeș and Coman, but when the referee waved play on, the UTA striker lost his temper and tried to take revenge on Celic. For that he saw a second yellow and was sent off. In the 45th minute, Costache recklessly fouled Végh off the ball in midfield, an offence that should have resulted in a red card, but VAR did not intervene, probably due to the lack of a proper replay.

In the second half we could have capitalised on our numerical advantage, but somehow we didn’t know how to handle the situation. Róbert Ilyés even went all-in, replacing Celic with Jebari and Anderson with Eppel, switching to two strikers in an attempt to break Iliev’s goal. The best chance fell to substitute Bödő in the 78th minute, when he connected well with Ferenczi’s cross from the left, but his powerful header was not well placed enough.

It was no surprise that the team couldn’t really celebrate the point after the final whistle, but our supporters were still grateful, singing the Szekler anthem together with the players in Arad.

At the post-match press conference, head coach Róbert Ilyés did not hold back: he was not satisfied with the draw, nor with the attitude of some players: “Maybe we didn’t even deserve this one point, unfortunately we didn’t have the right attitude. In the first half the game was balanced, both teams tried to break down the opposition’s defence, but our second-half performance was very frustrating, when we played with a man advantage but it barely showed, we couldn’t create or build, apart from Bödő’s chance we probably didn’t even shoot on target. Mentally we are under pressure because we can’t win the first match, the crisis is deepening, the players are suffering, the staff are suffering and everyone around the team is suffering, because we are all working to avoid relegation and climb from the bottom of the table.”

In the next round, on October 4, we will host Universitatea Cluj.

Superliga, regular season, Round 11
UTA Arad–FK Csíkszereda 0–0

Referees: Moldoveanu Cristian, Marinescu Vasile Florin, Popescu Adrian. VAR: Szabolcs Kovács. AVAR: Daniel Mitruti. Fourth official: Lucian Claudiu Rusandru.
Yellow cards: Coman (30’, 43’), respectively Palmeș (40’), Végh (50’), Veres (76’), Szabó (87’)
Red card: Coman (43’)

UTA: Iliev Deyan – Țuțu Mark (Barbu David Andrei 56’), Poulolo Florent Gregoire, Pospielov Dmytro, Alomerovic Din (Benga Alexandru C-tin 90+5.) – Van Durmen Benjamin, Roman Alin (Padula Andrea 56’), Costache Valentin Ionuț (Mihai Luca Alessandro 56’), Tzioni Marinos, Coman Marius Cătălin, Hrezdac Denis Lucian (Popescu Ovidiu Marian 71’).
Head coach: Mihalcea Dumitru Adrian

FK Csíkszereda: Pap Eduard – Pászka Lóránd, Celic Maks (Jebari Soufiane 69’), Palmeș Raul, Ferenczi János – Végh Bence, Veres Szilárd, Anderson Ceara (Eppel Márton 74’), Bakos Ervin (Bödő Efraim 71’), Szalay Szabolcs – Dolny Jozef.
Head coach: Róbert Ilyés

Rédai Attila