New Delhi: Indonesia’s Daftar Nama Kontingen boys defeated Delhi Public School from Haryana 7-0, while the outfit from Chhattisgarh’s St. Xavier’s Higher Secondary School beat Lakshadweep’s school by the same margin to close in on a quarterfinal berth in the ongoing Junior Boys (Under-17) league matches in the 56th Subroto Cup International Football Tournament at the Ambedkar Stadium here today.
With the two teams forming part of the same pool, they are aware that only one team can go through to the knockout stage. Hence there was some urgency as well as a pattern to their scoring against their opponents.
It will be interesting to know which of the two makes the cut as both have a match in hand tomorrow. Even otherwise, things will be clear only after the second phase of pool engagements come to an end.
The Panipat boys were a beaten side even before their opponents scored their first goal in the eighth minute by Raka Askara. The drooping shoulders of Haryana team members and the posture said it all. As if on cue, the Indonesians continued their onslaught as Rizky A.W. scored four minutes after to consolidate their position.
After the interval, the Indonesians were even more attacking and it resulted in five of their goals coming in this session. Rizky started it all with a goal in the 39th minute and followed it up with another in the next minute to complete a hat-trick. Egi Maulana, substitute Dedi Tri Maulana and Kader Raditya scored once each soon after Rizky to demolish Haryana.
Chhattisgarh boys, too, followed the pattern at the distant NWC ground and struck two in the first half and added five in the second. Their first goal coming in the 22nd minute when Chandra Kumar netted in before Vinay Portay scored in the 35th minute as the teams went into the breather.
Ganshyam slotted his first goal—he scored his second in the 62nd minute—two minutes into the second half game, even as Chandra Kumar completed his brace in the 39th minute. After that Anand Kumar scored twice for what was an easy win for the St. Xavier’s boys.
In a pool E match, Tripura Sports School, Agartala, defeated TAFS 6-0. Parvaj, who scored a brace, started the proceedings with a goal in the 20th minute and added two more before the interval through Pritam in the 32nd and 34th minutes. He returned after back to complete a hat-trick as he struck one more four minutes into the second half. Latr Parvaj added to his tally in the 61st and Chowmgraijamatib completed with a goal in the next minute.
If Lakshadweep and Haryana squads suffered heavily, there was no respite for the TAFS against the northeastern team. But what was surprising in all the three matches was that none of the losing outfits made even half-attempts, leave alone a good try.
