We arrived at the Plate Quarter-Final stage and we would shortly see eight teams reduced to four teams. We had a really high quality line-up in the Plate with many of the teams having played Cup football before and previous Plate winners featuring. We had teams from England, France, Poland and Portugal vying for the Plate trophy.

To begin it was Southgate FMU (Por) versus OS Sadinos (Por). Southgate County were victorious at this level at the 2016 Lisbon Tournament. They started off with a 2-1 win over SNQTB (Por) before a narrow 1-0 lost to French finalists World Pinteur. They then returned to winning ways 3-0 against Your Mum (Eng) before another narrow defeat, 3-2, to eventual winners Parques Tejo (Por). They qualified for the Plate and went all the way to glory thanks to a 2-1 win over Shrewsbury Townsend in the Semi-Finals and another win against Your Mum (2-0) in the Plate Final.

Today there were up against a sharp looking OS Sadinos team. The Portuguese had lost a couple of games early on 1-0 but won the rest and were growing into the tournament. The goals were beginning to flow for them with a 5-1 win in their previous match. That continued here as they raced into the lead with goals from Diogo Madureira and Diogo Braganza. That same pair were responsible for OS Sadinos increasing that lead to 4-0. Pedro Charrano finished the scoring to complete a 5-0 victory and the Portuguese had charged into the Semi-Finals.

There was to be no second Lisbon Plate trophy for Southgate County….not in the Open Age at least.

In the lower half of the Quarter-Final draw it was Blue Collar Revolution (Fra) versus AFC Blue Boys (Pol). AFC Blue Boys had reached the Plate Final on debut at the 2021 Barcelona Fives where they were defeated by FC Maroon in a penalty shoot-out. Then at the 2022 Mallorca Fives last month they lost 2-1 to France's Los Froggies Del Patron at the Quarter-Final stage. They were now up against another French side in the Plate Quarter-Finals. From an AFC Blue Boys perspective, hopefully with a different result.

This game was going to be a tough one to call in the sense that Blue Collar Revolution had emerged as one of the tournament favourites with three wins in their first three games – they had scored 13 without reply. But since then, they had lost 2 in a row. Was this a sign of a waning superpower or could they rediscover that early magic?

One man that certainly had that magic touch restored was captain Maxime Hatton. He had three goals in the tournament so far and he was about to take his tally to four with the opening goal in this tie. A goal in the first half may well have restored the French team's belief. They reached the half way stage with the 1-0 lead in tact. As the game progressed the scored the killer second goal. It was Maxime Hatton again with the strike. Blue Collar Revolution were back to winning ways and booked their place in the Plate Semi Finals.

Our commiseration to AFC Blue Boys. Déjà vu had struck again. We very much look forward to seeing them again later in the year at the 2022 Barcelona Fives where hopefully they will avoid a French team in the Plate QF!

The final Quarter-Final saw Sirkumo FC take on FC Shark. This was another game that featured a team who had reached a Plate Final before. In fact, FC Shark were bidding to win a third successive Plate title. This was an achievement that had only been recorded once before in our events when CSF won the 2009 Algarve Open, 2009 Amsterdam Fives and the 2009 Valencia Fives. If FC Shark were to go on and win the Plate they would be just the fourth team to win a hat-trick of such titles.

Sirkumo FC last time out had reached the Cup SF (as Elysian FC) at the 2019 Alicante Tournament and so represented a particularly large obstacle for FC Shark in their pursuit of a historic third Plate title.

With the action underway it was a closely fought opening period that remained goal-less but we then saw two quickfire goals. Mobin Budi scored his 6 th of the tournament to put Sirkumo FC 1-0 up but Chris Breen quickly equalized for 1-1. We then remained at 1-1 for a good length of time before Zeeshan Ali fired Sirkumo FC ahead with 3 minutes left on the clock.

There was still time for FC Shark to get back in this and maybe force a penalty shootout if they could score a second equalizer. However, it was Sirkumo FC who put the game to bed when Zak Lunat made it 3-1 and seal a Semi-Final tie against Blue Collar Revolution.