English
Couldn’t have asked for the better final. As they say, “History repeats itself” and that’s exactly what happened in today’s match when ATK fought hard for their second ISL title and defeated Kerala 4-3 via penalties. This was the second time when both the teams faced each other in finals, previously being in 2014 and result remained the same as ATK once again turned out to be victorious.
Kerala started the game with an attacking strategy and they played the offensive game consistently throughout the first half. The game was played at a high tempo throughout and constantly kept the crowd hanging on the edge of their seats. It was pretty end-to-end stuff which we witnessed during the first 45 minutes of the match. Chances were created, last ditch tackles and blocks being pulled out. It was entertaining and it was predictable that a goal was just around the corner.
It was in 37th minute when Mohammed Rafi headed in a beautiful corner from Mehtab Hossain and put the hosts in the lead. It seemed they would have the lead going into the break but right at the stroke of half time, Henrique Sereno too scored off a corner for the visiting side and brought things back on the level term.
The game resumed in a similar fashion as of first half and both the teams were trying to put pressure on each other by attacking. However, the tempo of the game slowed own in between and both sides seemed more focused on keeping the ball and maintaining the possession. Though some good chances were created by Kerala and ATK but neither of them succeeded in capitalising on those chances and second half remained goalless which also indicated that game will go into two extra times of 15 minutes each.
In the extra time, teams came out with the strategy to defence, thus neither of the teams found the back of the net and the match entered its last stage i.e penalties. ATK started with trailing as their first penalty was brilliantly saved by Kerala’s goalie, Graham Stack. Though Kerala gained the advantage in the very beginning of penalties but they failed to capitalise on that and Didier Boris Kadio missed the third penalty for the home side, by sending it over the bar.
It all came down to square one when ATK netted their next penalty. It was the fifth penalty for Kerala which made all the difference as the home side failed to score on this one. Hengbart blasted it dead centre and blasted it low and Majumder dived to his right but still managed to get his boot on it and saved it for ATK. Then, Jewel Raja Shaikh stepped up to take the 5th penalty of ATK and put it on the right. That was it. At this point ATK won their second ISL title and this win made them the first side to win the tournament twice, an immense achievement in Indian Super League’s short history.
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