Itimi Dickson shone on his international debut, Noh Alam Shah and Indra Sahdan did the damage for Singapore, but it was an all-round team display that secured the Lions their first win of 2004 - a morale boosting 2-0 win over Indonesia.

Better late than never and the win must have brought a smile to the face of Lions coach Radojko Avramovic, who has seen his charges go down to the likes of Norway in January right up to a loss against Malaysia in July.

Avramovic started with a new-look midfield combination of Syed Fadhil, Shahril Ishak, Goh Tat Chuan and the effervescent debutant Dickson first on the right, then on the right and they took the first quarter of the match to get settled in against the nippy Indonesians.

With playmaker Syamsul Bachri and forward Bambang Pamungkas looking lively for the visitors, they edged possession in the opening minutes without truly threatening Hassan Sunny's goal.

Lions defender Baihakki Khaizan's glancing header off Shahril Ishak's freekick that drifted wide was just about the only decent look at goal in the first half-hour as both teams found little attacking penetration to match their build-ups.

That's not to say that it was poor fare dished up to the 3,030 crowd at the Jalan Besar Stadium though - both the Lions and Indonesia conducted the game at a decent pace throughout. And if nothing else, they were entertained by the sight of Indonesia coach Peter Withe's animated protests as he contrived to protest just about every decision of referee Vo Minh Tri's.

Nigerian-born Dickson was quiet in the opening stages, but when he found his feet the impact was major as the Lions took the lead after 39 minutes.

Dickson's sweeping cross from the right lofted over the grasp of Indonesia keeper Hendro Kartiko's reach, and Alam Shah was on hand at the far post to nod home for 1-0. It was a just reward for the Tampines Rovers striker, who was full of running on his return to the national team.

The buzz of optimism around Jalan Besar Stadium could have dissipated on the stroke of half-time though when Lions leftback Noh Rahman gave away a needless penalty by hacking down Ponaryo Astaman despite the fact that the Indonesian captain was heading away from goal.

Bambang's stroked penalty was poorly struck though, and Hassan dived low to his right to claw it away as Singapore went into the break a goal up. That was a key moment in the match, as Avramovic admitted: "Hassan's save changed the game."

And just as Dickson grew in stature to make his presence felt, forward Indra made light of a quiet first half to hit a second Singapore goal minutes after half-time with a classic strike.

Indra's goal resulted from a combination with Home United team-mate Imran Sahib as he collected Imran's low center, glided past Warsidi Ardi and squeezed a diagonal shot past Hendro's dive.

The goal knocked the stuffing out of Indonesia and they never quite looked like the team they were in the first half, a fact aknowledged by Englishman Withe.

"I was pleased with the performance in the first half as we created several problems for Singapore, but we didn't play well in the second half.

"The problem is that we are not scoring goals. If we play like that and start scoring, our chances of winning the Tiger Cup are great. If we don't start scoring, then it will be difficult to win games," said Withe.

Avramovic might have been forgiven for dwelling a little on his team's first win of the season, but the Serbo-Montenegrin was demanding more from the Lions ahead of Wednesday's World Cup qualifier against Oman.

"We played better (than in previous matches) tonight but we still gave away the ball unnecessarily on many occasions. This is a problem that we will have to try to eliminate," said Avramovic.

Singapore 2 Indonesia 0 - Match stats here