Hot favourites Mumbai Districts as expected were a dominant lot and recorded an authoritative 4-0 win against Nagpur District in a semi-final match of the WIFA Inter-district women football championship and played at Palghar on Friday.
Striker Akansha Kandalkar, Nishka Prakash, Karen Pais, and Valencia D’Mello contributed with a goal apiece to seal Mumbai’s win.
Later in the evening, Kolhapur District got the better of Pune District 2-1 to set up a title clash with Mumbai on Saturday. Sonali Salvi scored Kolhapur’s first goal in the 36th minute before Samruddhi Katkole doubled the lead striking the second in the 77th minute. Pune managed to pull one back through Aishwarya Jagtap’s efforts in the 89th minute.
The Mumbai girls showed excellent coordination and perfect teamwork to unsettle the plans of the Nagpur outfit. Settling down quickly Mumbai rocked the Nagpur citadel in the sixth minute with Akansha finding the back of the net to open the scoring. A half hour later Nishka added the second to give Mumbai a solid 2-0 half-time cushion.
The Nagpur girls were unable to match the more skillful Mumbai girls and were left with the tough task of trying to contain the opponent strikers. The Nagpur defence which came under tremendous pressure conceded the third goal scored by Junior India striker Karen Pais in the 62nd minute. Mumbai added the fourth in the 86th minute through their prolific goal scorer Valencia to complete the rout.
Results – semi-finals: Kolhapur District 2 (Sonali Salvi 36, Samruddhi Katkole 77) beat Pune District 1 (Aishwarya Jagtap 89).
Mumbai District 4 (Akansha Kandalkar, Nishka Prakash, Karen Pais, Valencia D’Mello) beat Nagpur District 0.