The Hindu : Sport / Football : Hard-earned wins for East Bengal, Dempo

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Friday, Nov 05, 2004

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Hard-earned wins for East Bengal, Dempo

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI, NOV. 4. A depleted East Bengal was confronted with some unexpected challenge from Army XI in its opening group `B' match of the Durand Cup football tournament at the Amedbkar Stadium here on Thursday. East Bengal came back from a deficit to score a 3-1 victory.

In group `D', Dempo Club, Goa too began on a winning note when it overcame Tata Football Academy 2-1.

It was difficult for East Bengal to get its act together in the absence of seven key players — Baichung Bhutia (nursing injury), Sangram Mukherjee, Deepak Mondal, Habib-ur-Rehman, Climax Lawrence and Alivita D'Cunha (on India duty, playing a friendly in Kuwait).

The team was also without two "family members" — Dipankar Roy and Sasthi Duley, under police custody for allegedly sheltering a bad character. "They are like our family members and we're concerned about them," said coach Bikas Panji as he assessed East Bengal's lacklustre show.

Syed Rahim Nabi was the man to watch as he produced some good moves when his side was down by a bizarre goal midway through the first half. From his half, Angam's indirect shot grazed goalkeeper Rajat Dastidar's fingers and went into the goal. "The bounce was uneven," said Dastidar. East Bengal ended the session in arrears after Bijen Singh came close to scoring with a header.

East Bengal was a transformed side in the second half. Within a minute on resumption, Paulo Silva, the versatile Brazilian, succeeded with an angular drive. And the Army side was constantly under pressure once Nabi and Douglas Santos, the other Brazilian professional, found their acts together. East Bengal earned a penalty in a counter-attack as Douglas was brought down by R. Ramesh. The penalty was converted by Chandan Das.

With 20 minute left, the Army men blotted their image when Angam roughed up the referee, Abdul Saleem, when he awarded East Bengal a penalty. The referee had overlooked Paulo handling the ball and instead penalised Angam for blocking the shot on the goalline. The Army camp claimed Angam had chested the ball down but that could not have been an excuse for their behaviour. When things threatened to go out of control, the Organising Secretary, Lt. Col. Ramphal, rushed to the ground to pacify the army team. Paulo converted the penalty and Angam ended up with a red card suspension.

East Bengal will now meet Sporting Club, Goa to decide the group qualifier for the semifinals. The Goan team had defeated Army XI 1-0.

TFA out

Dempo Club failed to impress but stayed on course with an improved show in the second half. After a barren first session, Johny D'Cruz found the goal with a curling right footer from outside the box even as goalkeeper Pal Shilton tried his best to punch the ball and Ronty Martins consolidated the lead by beating substitute goalkeeper Arindam Bhattacharya with a deft placement on the turn.

TFA, which dominated the last 20 minutes of the match, did well to reduce the margin when Lalam Puia scored with a superb free kick from outside the box. In the closing stages, the hardworking Satish Kumar blew away two chances. For TFA, which made its exit from the tournament following the second defeat, Lalam and Mark Fernandes stood out.

The group qualifier will now be decided from the Dempo-JCT contest.

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