Action during the Bengal-Punjab final in Gurgaon on Wednesday. A Telegraph picture

Gurgaon: Bengal’s dream of regaining the Santosh Trophy after six years lay shattered on the pitch of Devi Lal Sports Complex here on Wednesday when they went down 3-5 to Punjab in the tie-breaker after holding their rivals grimly to a goalless draw for 120 minutes.

The last nail on Bengal’s coffin was hit by defender Harpreet Singh, who drove in firmly the fifth and the last shot past goalkeeper Abhra Mondal to give Punjab their first national championship title after 18 years. In between, midfielder Suman Dutta proved the villain in the Bengal ranks when his weak shot was saved by Punjab custodian Kameshwar with a prompt dive to his left.

It was certainly a heartbreak for Bengal, who have worked their way from the cluster stages to make the title-round first time since 1999. But given the trend of the match, the 29-time champions should consider themselves lucky to be able to drag the tie till the shootout period.

It was also a big disappointment for the large number of Bengal fans, who turned up in this Haryana township with drums, flags and posters. They cheered their team all through with vociferous support but that could hardly bring the desired effect on their team’s display. Bengal’s performance was simply insipid. They surrendered the midfield to their rivals from the moment go and could hardly ever recover it.

To say Punjab were truly the deserving winners would hardly be the right statement. They, too, looked a wayward lot and thrived on Bengal’s inability to push things to the rival area. That they were able to test the Bengal goal ’keeper more than their opponents was their only qualification.

Midfield had been Bengal’s problem throughout the tournament. Nothing improved in the final. Coach Prasanta Banerjee on Tuesday talked about pushing the midfielders more into the attack. In reality, it hardly happened. Neither Dipendu Biswas nor Syed Rahim Nabi received the required support from the midfield and could never build up cohesive attacks.

So weak was Bengal’s thrust in the opponent half that they could create only a couple of positive chances. While Rahim Nabi wasted the first, Ashim Das fumbled to take a shot on the second occasion despite being placed in an ideal position.

Defence was Bengal’s only bright spot. Without them Bengal could have lost the match in the regulation period itself. While Sanjeev Maria was rock solid at the rear, the others also played their part well to avoid disaster.

After two quick moves were created past the Bengal midfield in the first half, Banerjee realised the danger. He tried to plug the hole by bringing in Snehasish Chakraborty in place of Tapan Maity, but it backfired. Luck deserted Bengal as Chakraborty aggravated his earlier injury and had to make way for Ratan Das. In the extra time, Avinash Thapa also got injured, thus leaving the Bengal midfield in total mess.

It’s not that Punjab didn’t suffer setbacks. The exit of Shivraj Singh in the middle was a big blow for the ultimate champions. It was even worse as Punjab, by that time, had already made two changes earlier. Yet, they attacked with vigour and had the Bengal defence in all sorts of trouble in the extra time. So tired was the Bengal defence by that time that even Maria received a yellow card for time wasting.

TEAMS

Punjab: TH Kameshwar; Jaspal Singh, Narinder Singh, Harpreet Singh and Daljit Singh; Bimanyu Birua, Sukhjinder Singh (Hardeep Saini, 60th), Shivraj Singh (Gurwinder Singh, 73rd) and Amrinder Singh (Jaswinder Singh, 46th); Baldeep Singh and Praveen Kumar.

Bengal: Abhra Mondal; Habibur Rehman, Sanjeev Maria, Shyam Mondal and Suman Dutta; Avinash Thapa (Madhusudan Majumdar, 115th), Ashim Das, Saumik Dey and Tapan Maity (Snehasish Chakraborty, 46th, Ratan Das, 87th), Dipendu Biswas and Syed Rahim Nabi.

Referee: Dinesh Nair.

the shootout

Following is the sequence of the penalties taken in the Santosh Trophy final shootout:
• Praveen Kumar scores, Dipendu Biswas scores; 1-1
• Jaspal Singh scores, Sanjeev Maria scores; 2-2
• Narinder scores, Suman Dutta’s shot saved; Punjab 3-2
• Daljit Singh scores, Shyam Mondal scores; Punjab 4-3
• Harpreet Singh scores; Punjab win 5-3