Mumbai FC coach Khalid Jamil was very upset as the team squandered a 2-1 advantage and made some costly blunders, which resulted in a 2-3 defeat against Sporting Clube de Goa in a seventh round match of the 2015-2016 AIFF Hero I-League football tournament, and played at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium, Fatorda, Margao, Goa on Sunday evening.
Opportunistic striker Sushil Kumar Singh scored once in each half and Nicholas Fernendes one for Sporting as Mumbai FC were leading till the 75th minute. However, a minute later Mumbai FC defender Anwar Ali in an attempt to clear the ball with a bicycle kick accidentally struck the face of Glen Martins who clumsily went for a header. The referee Rowan Arumughan pulled up the defender and awarded Sporting a penalty which was converted by their captain Odafa Okolie who sent Mumbai FC goalkeeper Pawan Kumar the wrong way.
Ten minutes later, Odafa who was cutting in from the left, fell after a tackle from Mumbai FC defender Pratik Chowdhary, who seemed to have played the ball. But he was punished as the referee awarded Sporting a second penalty which was again converted by Odafa to give the Goans a 3-2 lead, which they managed to hold on to snatch a victory and the full three points.
Jamil did not have any excuses for the defeat. “I have nothing to say. I am upset about the way things went. I had warmed my players that since, this is an away match to be careful inside the box and also outside the box. But everything did not go according to plan. I am disappointed,” he said after the game.
The win has lifted Sporting to fourth position with 11 points from their third win in seven matches, while the Mumbai side with nine points also from seven games slipped to fifth place.
Earlier, both the teams came out in attacking fashion and the first attempt at goal came in the 6th minute from the home side, but an alert Mumbai FC goalkeeper Pawan Kumar came to the rescue of the team with timely save when he dived to his left to push out for a corner Mehrajuddin Wadoo’s powerful grounder from the edge of the box in the sixth minute. Later Mumbai FC’s wing back Allan Dias showed great anticipation as he dashed towards the centre of the penalty area and did well to foil Ganesh Thakur who latched on to Odafa’s through pass and was moving dangerously towards goal in the 15th minute.
Mumbai FC having survived those two close shaves got on the scoreboard a couple of minutes later. Following a corner from the right Eric Brown played a short pass to wing back Srikant Ramu, who chipped across the rival goal. The Sporting defenders could only manage a weak clearance which fell perfectly for Sushil who tapped home.
The Goan club took that setback in their stride and came back stronger and managed to capitalize on a bit of misunderstanding between the Mumbai FC defenders to score the equalizer in the 24th minute. The Mumbai FC defenders were late in reacting and trying to cut out Odafa through pass for Nicholas who moved in unchallenged and beat goalkeeper Kumar with a left-footer from just outside the six yard box.
The remaining period of the first half did not witnessed clear goal-scoring chances created by both teams and the scores stayed tied at 1-1 at the end of the first half.
After switching ends the Mumbai side received a setback as their mainstay in the defence Min-Chol Son landed badly after a tackle and was stretched out in the 48th minute. He was replaced with Ashutosh Mehta.
The Mumbai outfit regained the lead when Sushil once found the back of the net in the 59th minute. Izumi Arata with a neat through ball put Sushil in the open and he kept his cool before deftly chipping over an onrushing Sporting goalkeeper Arindham Bhattacharya. Earlier, Mumbai FC custodian Kumar brought off a fine save diving to his left to gather Dharmaraj’s firm header in the 55th minute.
After Odafa scored from a penalty in the 76th minute, Mumbai FC’s hard-working media Izumi Arata failed to score from two successive attempts, which could have changed things around. Those misses proved costly as at the other end Odafa earned a penalty and scored the winner.
In the next round Mumbai FC, take on Aizawl FC in an away fixture on Saturday, February 20.
Result – Sporting Clube de Goa (Nicholas Fernandes 24th, Odafa Okolie 76th-pen, 86th-pen) beat Mumbai FC (Sushil Kumar Singh 17th, 59th). Man-of-the-match: Odafa Okolie (Sporting Clube de Goa).