East Bengal players Penn Orji (right) celebrates his goal with Uga Okpara, in Cuttack, on Saturday. A Telegraph picture

Cuttack: Riding on a 67th minute goal by Penn Orji, defending champions East Bengal beat Pune Football Club 1-0 to sail into the semi-finals of the 32nd Federation Cup Football Tournament here at Barabati Stadium Saturday.

This was the third win on the trot for six-time champions East Bengal, who topped the table in the Group A quarter final league, garnering full nine points.

They earlier beat Air India 3-1 and HAL 2-1. In the first semi-final here on September 29, East Bengal will cross swords with Churchill Brothers, who topped the Group B table with five points at Vasco, Goa.

After a barren first half, Nigerian recruit Penn netted the all-important goal off a through pass from the middle. He controlled the ball beautifully and beat Pune FC custodian Balaji Narasimhan with a precise shot.

The Calcutta giants would have won the match by a bigger margin had they converted three more chances that came their way. Australian striker Tolgay Ozebe, who scored three goals in the previous two matches, missed two chances to increase his individual tally. His powerful left-footer in the 32nd minute was punched away by the opposition custodian. It was the only occasion when any of the teams came close to taking the lead in the first half.

After the change of ends, Ozebe had another opportunity to score off a Reisangmi Vashum pass, but missed the target. East Bengal had one more opportunity to increase their lead, but it was foiled by the Pune FC custodian, who punched away a booming shot from Harmanjot Singh Khabra in the 80th minute.

The Pune side got two chances to take lead or level the score, but both were lost in vain. In the 53rd minute, K.N.Ajayan’s shot was saved by East Bengal goalkeeper Sandip Nandy and in the 85th minute Asim Hassan’s free kick went inches over the crossbar.

TEAMS

East Bengal: Sandip Nandy, Naoba Singh, Nirmal Chetri, Uga Okpara, Saumik Dey, Reisangmi Vashum (Janju Pradhan, 66th), Mehtab Hossain (Sushanth Mathew, 88th), Harmanjot Singh Khabra, Penn Orji, Robin Singh (Budiram Tudu, 58th), Tolgay Ozebe.

Pune Football Club: Balaji Narasimhan, Othallo Tabia, Caitano Costa, Selwyn Fernandes, Shanmugam Venkatesh, K.N.Ajayan, Edmar Figueira, Gurjinder Kumar, Asim Hassan (J Prasad, 65th), Paresh Shivalkar (Lester Fernandes, 60th), Reisang Pemmi (Mandjou Keita, 51st).

Referee: Magho Singh (Manipur).