After their third match in the league, the Devilz maintained one thing for sure, they are the team to beat.  They were able to build up on their previous two wins with a 56^th minute winner by their skipper. With the win, the Devilz are comfortably placed in the league with a healthy 6 points lead, ahead of second place Daemons.

Devilz had a shaky start though. The absence of Bishwa, who was unavailable for the game, was felt right from the beginning. BigFoots had some good early chances and made Services look vulnerable except for the early chance that fell to Tej whose fierce shot thumped hard on the woodwork, only to deflect to the wrong side of the goal. Roshan was perfectly set up in 25^th minute in front of Devilz goal by Hitesh, which he failed to capitalize on.

BigFoots did press the Devilz hard but the Devilz were first on the scoresheet.  They received a free kick just outside the left corner of the D-box in the 27^th minute which Bhuwan utilized to the fullest. The ball flew straight through the BigFoots wall into the goal as the BigFoots keeper watched.

It wasn’t very long though before the lead was cancelled out. A beautiful header by Pratik shortly after the restart, in the 34^th minute corner, made sure the battle was both teams’ to be won.  Buoyed by the leveler, BigFoots pushed forward and found themselves in a good position to go ahead when Roshan delivered an inviting  ball with his free-kick which Prashanta  missed by a whisker. On the other side of the pitch, the ball was scrambled away from the post in a nicely taken corner.

Just when everyone thought the game was heading to a deadlock, substitute Kumar rolled out a beautiful ball to Tej, who made sure the ball got pass the BigFoots goalie. As things turned out, that 56^th minute goal was to decide the fate of the game. BigFoots had too little time to make any significant impact. With scoreboard reading Devilz 2 and BigFoots 1, this vital win has made the Devilz hot favorites to bag the first ever D2 football league.

 

Match Statistics:

Gameweek 5, 21st March 2009

D2 Devilz              2-1          QA BigFoots

Bhuwan 27′                         Pratik 34′

      Tej 56’

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Half-time 1-0

 

Lineup:

D2 Devilz :1-Khagendra(GK), 2-Pradeep, 3-Pragya, 4-Bishwadeep, 6-Bhuwan, 7-Abhishesh, 8-Tej(C), 9-Milan, 10-Anup(15-Kumar, 45′), 11-Richan(14-Suresh, 47′), 12-Raju

QA BigFoots: 1-Subin(GK), 6-Amit, 2-Aashish, 4-Pratik, 9-Abhishek, 3-Prajwal, 7-Shankar, 10-Hitesh, 13-Prashant(C), 14-Manik(11-Manish,50′), 9-Roshan

Cards:

Khagendra(Y, 58′)

 

Match Report by: Rajiv, Vinay, Saroj

Match Fotos: Niraj