East Bengal’s Cristiano Junior (left) in a tussle with Tollygunge defenders at Salt Lake Stadium on Saturday. Picture by Santosh Ghosh

Calcutta, Dec. 20: East Bengal brought home three points against Tollygunge Agragami in a National Football League match on Friday, thanks to Cristiano Junior’s opening-minute goal.

The final verdict, however, looked deceptive in that it would not reflect the domination of East Bengal over a team, which was undefeated in the tournament before this match. The win may be much in line with coach Subhas Bhowmick’s scheme of things, planned for a marathon league, but his team’s inept finishing on innumerable occasions should cause one or two furrows on his forehead as well.

Bhowmick had talked about a cautious approach against Krishnendu Roy’s boys on the match-eve. Instead, the red-and-gold brigade started off on a boisterous note. Bhowmick fielded both Sasthi Duley and Shylo Malsawmtluanga — known for their attacking instincts —in the starting line-up, though the former was operating a little deep.

When Bhaichung Bhutia released a ball for Junior, it looked nothing but a laid-back move. But the Brazilian had other ideas at a time when the rival defence was still settling in their zone after the kick-off.

Junior visualised the uneasiness in the Tollygunge backline and promptly unleashed a low dipping shot from about 25 yards which had no answer from goalkeeper Chinmoy Banerjee.

Then in a fine attacking spell of ten minutes, East Bengal toyed with the defence on the opposite end. Alvito D’Cunha was the creator of all moves during that period, among which Malsawmtluanga’s chip was not strong enough to cross over the goalline as Chinmoy came out of his position to challenge him and Debjit Ghosh’s header forced a save from Kabijit Khotel on the line.

The fact that Chinmoy’s audacity under the Tollygunge bar was as much a joy to watch as Alvito’s return to form, suggests how the NFL champions completely dominated the proceedings at Salt Lake Stadium.

The likes of Bhaichung usually don’t like others grabbing limelight and such occasions inspire them to rise to the billing. The East Bengal striker tried his best.

But it was just a combination of his misfortune, lack of finishing and above all, a brilliant Chinmoy, that denied him a mention on the scoresheet.

Bhaichung looked completely flabbergasted when Chinmoy jack-knifed his flick-on from handshaking distance on the stroke of halftime and how the goalkeeper stood in the way of his shot’s trajectory from another six-yard attempt after the change of sides.

With Bhaichung and Co. missing one sitter after another, surviving a one-goal advantage almost through out the match also meant East Bengal rearguard was forced to live on the edges in some phases.

Though Suley Musah hardly allowed Akeem Abolanle to roam around, Tollygunge attacks were mostly borne out of long-rangers. In the dying minutes, Amitabha Chanda’s shot from a distance missed the target by a few yards.

After all, the very stadium had witnessed just the previous day how Mohammedan Sporting’s 1-0 cushion was ruined by two late strikes from Churchill Brothers.

“The way we have been missing goals is inexplicable. May be the forwards are lacking in confidence,” Bhowmick said later. He also hailed Chinmoy’s performance saying the Tollygunge goalkeeper had denied his team “at least three goals”.

Krishnendu, on the other hand, said conceding the first-minute goal had upset his team’s rhythm. “I told my boys to be careful about first quarter of the match. If we could keep East Bengal in check for that time, it might have been a different story,” he felt.

Teams

East Bengal: Sandip Nandy; Subhas Chakraborty, Mahesh Gawli, M. Suresh, Suley Musah; Sasthi Duley, Shylo Malsawmtluanga (Dipankar Roy, 77), Debjit Ghosh, Alvito D’Cunha (Tushar Rakshit, 70); Bhaichung Bhutia, Cristiano Junior (K. Kulothungan, 86).

Tollygunge Agragami: Chinmoy Banerjee; Kabijit Khotel, Isiaka Awoyemi, Ebi Bar Bar, Amitabha Chanda; Biman Mondal (Manik Barman, 68), Sandip Das (Suman Dutta, 48), Shamsi Reza, Jiten Rai; Gauranga Dutta, Akeem Abolanle.

Referee: Shaji Kurian (Kerala).

Dempo on top

Liberian striker Sunday Seah’s brace helped Dempo beat JCT 2-0 in Ludhiana, adds PTI. Seah struck in the third and 49th minutes to take Dempo to the top of the table with 13 points after five matches. JCT have seven from five.

In Chennai, Haywards Sporting beat Indian Bank 4-2 to take their points tally to eight.