Vivacious victory for Viva, 2-1

With captain M P Sakeer's 87th minute thriller, Viva Kerala moved to the tenth position in the I-League by beating Air India at the EMS Memorial Stadium here on Friday. VK Shibinlal opened the account for Viva while Air India's Nigerian Striker Ndubuisi Opara equalised in the 59th minute.

The first goal came from Noushad's ground ball from right side to Shibinlal and he neatly finished the goal by sending it to the right side of the box leaving the Air India custodian nothing much to do. Viva Kerala could keep up the lead until half time as the Airmen did not play as good as the home team. Ninety per cent of the possession in the first half was with Viva Kerala.

In the second half, it was a different Air India as they attacked the Viva box one after the other through the right flank. Opara and Kailash Patil did some impressive runs into the Viva post and almost created some near-goal attempts. Experienced defender Bello Razzaq played another impressive game for Viva as he defended several long throw balls from the Air India men. But Surjith failed to defend a long pass from the Air India midfield and made way for Opara to net the ball without any error.

The goal made Viva arouse from their lackluster performance and they attacked through their wings with the help of their skipper Sakeer. After some good chances created by Reuben and Anish, Viva captain Sakeer made a solo run from the midfield and scored a thriller for Viva from 20 yards. He scored dribbling past three Air India defenders to help his team bag three vital points from the game.

M P Sakeer was selected as the man of the match. Reuben Senyo and Surjith received yellow cards in the game.

New foreign striker for Viva Kerala - Shreedharan

Viva Kerala coach Sreedharan said that the club is trying to bring a foreign striker to end the goal drought. The signing will be materialised as soon as the negotiations are on the table, he said. He explained that both teams had a 50-50 chance in the game. "As both the teams have same points I expected a good fight to grab the three points. The match was very lively and I had informed about this to the players it earlier,'' he said. "My captain saved the day. Sakeer played well and he deserved the man-of-the-match award. Rueben also did work hard on the field,'' he said. "Air India scored from a defensive lapse. The defenders' concentration was lost and it should not have been happened,'' he said.

Meanwhile, Sreedharan flayed the refereeing. "The referee was against Viva Kerala. In the match against Chirag here, we had the same referee, who did not give us the penalty, which we were deserved,'' he said.

Air India coach blames weather

Air India coach Yusuf Ansari said that the hot weather here marred their performance. "We are coming from Mumbai where the temperature is just 20 Celsius. Here it is 32 and my boys were worn out. That is the main reason behind our bad performance.'' He said that yesterday they were mentally and physically fit for the game and the floodlight glitch made them to wait for another day and made his players tired. "It is not that we did not play well. Both teams had an equal chance,'' he said.

Teams:

Viva Kerala: Starting Eleven: Sharath K(GK), Noushad K, Charles Dzisah, Bello Rasaq, Surjith VV, T Karma, Raman Patrick Sisupalan, MP Sakeer (Captain), Sirajudeen C (75), Reuben Senyo, Shibinlal VK (45)
Substitutes: Sajesh P, Mohammed Marsook, Rahul P (75) , Anish KP (46) ,Amarwant Singh, Nishad KP, Shahinlal Meloly
Coach: AM Sreedharan
Assistant Coach: Bino George
Manager: Prasanthan K
Physio: Anas K

Air India

Starting Eleven: Kunal Sawant (GK), Khelemba Maitei, Uttam Kumar Singh, Suresh Menon, Okwagre Peter Odafe, Ravinder Singh, Vijeth Shetty, Yusuf Ibrahim Tijani, Henry Gangte, Kailash Patil, Ndbuisi Opara
Substitutes: Harpreet Singh, H Thomte, S James Singh, DadaNabeel, Reuben D’Souza, Santhosh Kohli, Shambumistry
Coach: Mohammed Yusuf Ansari
Assistant Coach: Jacinto D’silva
Manager: Subir Sinha
Physio: Khusboo Singhal

From the archive. First published on footballkerala.com on Friday 29 January 2010, restored from the site's 2012 database. Text as originally published.