McDowell Mohun Bagan end the season with a defeat

Mariners suffered a defeat at the hands of Prayag United (0-2) today in a CFL Premier Division match held in Siliguri. In the other match played at the Salt Lake Stadium, Kolkata, Kingfisher East Bengal thrashed Mohammedan Sporting 6-0 to lift the CFL Premier Division title.

Mariners today were completely outplayed by Prayag United and were lucky not to concede more goals. Joshimar and Kayne Vincent scored the goals for Prayag United.

TD Subrata Bhattacharya kept Shilton Pal as the goalkeeper. The defence lineup consisted of Surkumar Singh and Rahim Nabi as the 2 sidebacks, with Anwar Ali and Rakesh Masih in central defence. In midfield, Manish Maithani and Jewel Raja were in charge of central midfield while Hudson Lima and Manish Bharghav played as the left and right half respectively. Odafa Okolie and Sunil Chhetri played as the 2 strikers.

Prayag United took the lead in the 13th minute when Joshimar's header from Tulunga's free kick went inside goal. Shilton came out of charge to collect the ball and he was a bit slow to react, whereas the 2 stoppers Anwar and Rakesh left Joshimar completely unmarked and it was a sort of free header for Joshimar.

Few minutes later, Odafa showed good ball control as he got past a couple of defenders, but the ball got cleared by Bello Razaq. Odafa today was heavily marked by at least 3 defenders whenever he got the ball.

Manish Maithani unleashed a powerful right footed shot that narrowly missed the target midway through the 1st half. From Odafa's pass, Sunil Chhetri took a shot from acute angle but it went over the crossbar.

In the 35th minute, Sunil gave a good through pass to Odafa but he failed to trap the ball properly. In the very next minute, Rahim Nabi made an overlap run, played a wall pass with Odafa, entered opponent box, but was dispossessed by Prayag defence. He, however, managed to pass the ball to unmarked Manish Bharghav, who missed the easiest chance of the match for Mariners, as his push went out from close range.

Yakubu took a brilliant direct free kick in the 40th minute which luckily for Mariners just went out.

In the injury time, from Rahim Nabi's cross, Sunil Chhetri made a good spot jump to connect his header, but Prayag goalkeeper made a good save.

The 2nd half completely belonged to Prayag United. Snehasish Chakraborty replaced Hudson Lima at the start of 2nd half.  Yakubu and Joshimar missed 2 easy chances for Prayag around the 50th minute mark.

Against run of play, Snehasish got an opportunity to take a shot at the opponent goal, but he completely miscued his shot and the ball went towards the touch line.

In the 64th minute, a dazzling run from Odafa resulted in a good move down the left side. He nicely passed the ball to Jewel Raja at the edge of opponent box, but the latter's left footed shot went ballooning over the target.

Mariners brought in Ashim Biswas in place of Jewel Raja in the 67th minute. Rahim Nabi made another good run but failed to kept his shot down as it went out.

In the 80th minute, Deepak Mandal's push beat Shilton and hit the post. N. P. Pradeep replaced Manish Maithani in the 83rd minute.

In the fag end of the match, Kayne Vincent made the scoreline 2-0 in favour of Prayag United as his right footed shot bulged the net, with Shilton having no chance whatsoever to make a save.

McDowell Mohun Bagan thus finished runners-up of the CFL Premier Division with 20 points.

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