Tripura on Tuesday scored a convincing 5-1 victory over Rajasthan in their cluster VIII match of the 63rd National Football Championship for Santosh Trophy at the Jawaharlal Nehru Sadium, Chennai.
Tripura had defeated Himachal Pradesh 2-0 in their opening encounter and with this win are tied with Tamil Nadu on six points. Tripura dominated the match right from the start and kept Rajasthan custodian busy under the bar.
The victors drew the first blood in the 22nd minute as Utpal Chowdhary found the back of the net and two minutes later Swapan Roy extended the lead to make it 2-0.
As the match progressed there were more attacking moves made by Tripura. Rajasthan like their previous encounter once again crumbled infront of a strong attack. They hardly could have the control over the ball and the game was played mostly in their half.
In the 35th minute Shyamal Bhowmick got the ball past Rajasthan custodian to make it 3-0 before Paltu Dutta Chowdhury added one more in the 42nd minute to make it 4-0 just before the lemon break.
The start of the second witnessed Rajasthan making some good moves but lack of experience resulted in them failing to convert the chances that came their way.
But their hardwork paid off as in the 73rd minute they pulled one back. Vikas Gupta received a cross from the right flank and his powerful shot helped Rajasthan reduce the deficit to 4-1. But the goal came too late for them as they suffered their second consecutive defeat in the tournament as Bikram Damatia added his name to scoring sheet in the 84th minute to seal the fate of the game for his team.
Source: the-aiff.com
From the archive. First published on footballkerala.com on Tuesday 26 May 2009, restored from the site's 2012 database. Text as originally published.