Thursday, March 13, 2003

Hundreds of Japanese fans at Bangkok’s National Stadium fell into silence when the referee whistled on Wednesday dusk, ending Kashima Antlers’ struggle to change their 3-4 failure to China’s Shanghai Shenhua.

“This time the luck isn’t on us, ”said the Kashima Antlers coach Toninho Cerezo.

“But it’s an exciting match, ”said an anonymous official of the Asia Football Confederation(AFC) after the match.

If only judged by the number of shots, the match between Antlers and Shenhua was really an exciting one, which witnessed the most shots of seven in the AFC Champion League 2002/2003 quarter-final Group A.

The shot of Chinese player Yang Guang in two minutes seemed to predict the high frequency of shooting at this game.

In less than 10 minutes, Shenhua’s Chinese international Zhang Yuning scored one more goal for Shenhua.

Under the swift attack of Shenhua, Antlers’ Takuya Nozawa pulled one goal back at the 25th minute, while Shenhua’s Martinez Ascel scored the third goal in the 32nd minute.

The game grew more and more intense in the second half after Antler scored one more goal at the 14th minutes.

Wishing to draw the rival, Antlers beefed up its attack, while the match was interrupted several times by controversial whistles.

But Shenhua’s Martinez found the opportunity in about 80 minutes to have his second successful shoot, which almost set the result of the game.

Antlers’ desperate efforts brought them one more goal a few minutes before the end, but it was too late and the game ended at 4-3.

In a later game, Thailand’s BEC beat South Korea’s Taejon Citizen 2-0. BEC and Antlers, which drew on Monday’s match, will fight against Shenhua and Citizen respectively on Friday. Shenhua lost to Citizen by 1-2 on Monday.

1. What time did the match between Kashima Antlers and Shanghai Shenhua come to an end?

A. In the morning. 　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　 　　   B. At noon.

C. Before daybreak. 　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　   D. In the dusk.

2. What kind of match was it between Kashima Antlers and Shanghai Shenhua? It was 　　　　　　   .

A. a match in Chinese series A league

B. a match in the AFC Champion League 2002/2003 quarter-final Group A

C. a match between Japanese teams

D. a match between Italian teams

3. An anonymous man is a person who 　　　　　　   .

A. didn’t want anybody else to know who he is for some reason

B. didn’t like to tell anybody else about his team

C. a referee who doesn’t like to tell out the result of the match

D. a coach who doesn’t like to meet the journalists

4. How many goals did Martinez shoot?

A. 1. 　　　　    B. 2. 　　　　　　 C. 3. 　　　　　　　　   D. 4.

The time he has devoted in the past ten years ________ the disabled is now considered ________ of great value.