Mariners win practice match; Airlines Gold Cup semi final postponed

McDowell Mohun Bagan today defeated BNR 2-1 in a practice match held at the Salt Lake Stadium. Manish Bharghav and Anil Kumar scored the goals for Mariners.

Meanwhile, the two semi final matches of the All Airlines Gold Cup Tournament to be held on the 6th and 8th of August has been postponed to a further date due to unavailability of Salt Lake Stadium. The revised dates will be announced next week.

In the morning, the coaching staff of McDowell Mohun Bagan came to the club ground along with Odafa Okolie who did some physical training conducted by Fitness Coach. Santosh Kashyap wants to make Odafa match fit within 7-10 days time.

Other than Anyichie Echezona who played for full 90 minutes, Santosh Kashyap fielded 2 different squads in both half. Mariners played much better football post-breather compared to the 1st half and created a lot more chances in the 2nd half.

McDowell Mohun Bagan today played in 3-5-2 formation in both half. With Shilton Paul as goalkeeper, Anyichie Echezona, Mehrajuddin Wadoo and Warundeep Singh played as the 3 defenders. In midfield, Aiborlang Khongjee and Biswajit Saha played in right and left flank respectively. The central midfield consisted of Rakesh Masih, Snehasish Chakraborty and Manish Maithani. Tolgay Ozbey paired with Stanley Okoroigwe in forward line.

Tolgay made a good start as he made an angular run going past a couple of defenders before essaying a brilliant through pass towards Biswajit Saha but the latter sent a very weak cross which got cleared by BNR defence.

In the 1st half, Mariners made almost all the attacks down the left flank with Aibor struggling a bit in the right side. Biswajit and Snehasish combination earned few corners for the team but nothing resulted out of those.

Stanley was brought down a couple of times outside the BNR box, but the resultant free kicks taken by Tolgay and Mehraj went out of the target.

From Rakesh Masih's pass, Tolgay took a shot from an acute angle that went over the crossbar.

Mariners got another free kick when Stanley was brought down. Tolgay's piledriver free kick from around 30 yards out was nicely saved by BNR custodian.

Minutes before the lemon break, Mariners conceded a goal due to a mistake made by Warundeep Singh. The defender missed an easy header to gift the ball to the Nigerian striker of BNR who slotted home from close range.

In the 2nd half, Milton Bhowmick played as the goalkeeper. The defense lineup consisted of Anyichie Echezona, Sourav Chakraborty and Deepak. Bijendra Rai, Lalrin Fela and Arjun Chatterjee played in central midfield, while Manish Bharghav and Mohan Sarkar operated down the 2 flanks. Dipendu Biswas and C. S. Sabeeth played as the 2 strikers.

With only 1 foreigner in the 2nd half, Mariners dominated proceedings and put a lot of pressure on opponent defence. Even there were a lot of crosses coming from both flanks.

From Sabeeth's left footed cross, Dipendu's header from close range went out. Minutes later, Mohan Sarkar sent a nice cross which was brilliantly met by Sabeeth, diving forward with his right foot, but failed to keep his push down as it went over the target.

Sabeeth then missed a golden opportunity to score as his header from Lalrin Fela's cross went out.

Coach Santosh Kashyap then brought Anil Kumar and Nirapada Mandal in place of Dipendu Biswas and Lalrin Fela. Anil Kumar's 1st touch was a side volley taken from the edge of the box, from Mohan Sarkar's cross, that went straight to goalkeeper's hand.

Sabeeth and Anil came close to scoring but their header from Arjun and Deepak's cross went agonizingly close past the bar post.

Manish Bharghav restored parity from a right-footed long ranger shot.

Anil Kumar scored the winning goal at the fag end of the match. Mohan Sarkar sent a inch-perfect cross which was nicely headed by Sabeeth but the ball was going out. Anil Kumar brilliantly jumped forward to meet the ball with his head and placed it inside the goal, thus helping McDowell Mohun Bagan to win today's match by 2-1.

Anil Kumar said, "Few days back after the birth of my daughter, I scored the 1st goal during practice, but today I have scored the 1st goal in a practice match. I am very happy and would like to continue scoring whenever I get chance for my team."

Coach Santosh Kashyap was not at all impressed with today's performance
as he said, "We did not play good football today, there are many areas
which needs a lot of improvement. We will have to work on that in the
training sessions."

Meanwhile, Bhawanipore reached the semi final of the All Airlines Gold Cup when they defeated Kalighat Milan Sangha 3-2 in a quarter final match held at the Mohun Bagan ground.