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Kathmandu Sunday August 05, 2001 Shrawan 21, 2058.
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Eastern Region clinch
National football title
Post Report
KATHMANDU, Aug 4 – Eastern Region,
riding on Ritesh Thapa’s brilliance, defeated the Tribhuvan Club (TC) 5-4 to clinch
the 25th National Football Championship played at the Dashrath Stadium on Saturday.
The match was decided through tie-breaker
after the extra time failed to produce a result in a match that remained in a 1-1
deadlock after the regulation time. Thapa, the 19-year old Eastern ‘keeper, rose to
the occasion saving TC forward Sahila Maharjan’s shot with a spontaneous right dive.
The match was tilted towards the Eastern
team, when Banaya Choudhari of the army team, failed to put through the shot during the
tie-breaker as his shot hit the crossbar. However, the score was leveled 4-4 when Suraj
Khaling, skipper of the Eastern squad, cracked under pressure and failed to net the
penultimate shot.
Earlier, Surendra Tamang, the Eastern
forward, scored the first goal in the match through a penalty awarded to them due to
Banaya Choudhari’s ‘hand’ in the penalty area in the 33rd minute. The
armymen retaliated strongly to level the game 1-1 in the 36th minute through Bishwa Bairag
Samal.
The match, unlike the previous encounter
between two during the league phase, was more or less evenly contested with both the teams
trying to gain the ball in the midfield. The army outfit looked a different team today as
they opted for a change of tactics to curb the ever aggressive boys from the East.
Tribhuvan Club chose to play a defensive game to counter the in form Eastern forwards Hari
Thakuri and Surendra Tamang.
With both the goals scored in the first
half of the game, both the teams were seen vying for the ball to get the lead. The best
chance for the Easterners came in the 17th minute of the extra-time when Surendra Tamang
tried a 30-yarder from the right side of the ground. Chhannu Ram Choudhari, army goalie,
just managed to caress ball in the nick of time to extend the game till the penalty
shoot-out.
The TC defenders did a good job of marking
both of the Eastern forwards, Thakuri and Tamang. Although Thakuri showed some of his
earlier sparks whenever he was left unchecked, he never got the opportunity to score.
For the army team, Sahila Maharjan was the
best in the field today. He could be seen in full throttle even during the extra time of
the play, trying to create the opportunities in the midfield as well as sprinting to the
front to score.
The Eastern Region boys, who won both of
their earlier games 4-1, could not dominate the proceedings in the same manner in
today’s match. Suraj Khaling, captain of the team expressed his dissatisfaction with
the performance in the match. "Though we won today, we played under pressure and
could not play in the manner we should have," said Khaling after the outing.
On the other hand, TC skipper Chhannu Ram
Choudhari blamed ‘bad luck for the team’s defeat. "We changed our strategy
in today’s match owing to our earlier loss to them and it worked well, but we
can’t help luck," said a disappointed looking Choudhari.
In the match to decide the third placed
team, Mahendra Police Club defeated Central Region 3-1. Dev Narayan Choudhari scored twice
for the policemen, while Anil Adhikari scored one.
Gibesh Pandey scored the lone goal for the
Central Region.
Taekwondo selection concludes
Koshis Khadka, Dipak Bista and Kamal
Chhetri—gold medalists in the 8th SAF Games— won their matches in the taekwondo
selection tournament which was completed Saturday at the taekwondo complex, Satdobato.
A total of 24 players have been selected
for the close camp for the 9th South Asian Federation (SAF) Games to be held in Islamabad
this October.
Koshis Khadka of the Western Region did not
have to toil hard to defeat Nirmal Shrestha of Mid-western Region in the final of the
bantam weight (58-62 kg) category.
Deepak Bista, from Far-western Region, had
an easy time in the final of feather weight as he imposed flurry of punches to his rival
Tarakeshwor Nath Singh of Western Region. Kamal Chhetri representing Tribhuvan Club also
completed the task in same fashion to defeat Krishna Chaudhary of Western Region.
Manoj Kumar Singh of Mid-western Region won
the day’s most competitive fin weight final with a slender lead of 4-3 against Parag
Das of Western Region who had won his two previous games. Singh, though failed to embody
the first round came from back at later to place first from his category.
Kumar Bahadur Karki of Central Region
succeed to top the fly weight following his win over Hasta Bahadur Thapa of Tribhuvan
Club.
Other players in the camp:
Fin weight (upto 54 kg)- Kumar Manandhar
(Central), fly weight (54-58 kg) - Purna Yonjan (Eastern), bantam weight (58-62 kg) - Man
Bahadur Chaudhary (Mid-western), feather weight (62-67 kg) - Dorje Bahadur Tamang
(Tribhuvan Club), light (67-72 kg) - Kusum Lama (Eastern), welter (72-78 kg) - Shashi
Mahat (Tribhuvan Club), Ramji Prasad Dahal (Nepal Police) and Gopal Chauhan (Eastern);
Middle (78-84 kg) - Bhim Ranabhat (Tribhuvan Club), Chitra Khawas (Eastern) and Jiban
Chaudhary (Central); heavy weight (over 84 kg) - Govinda Sharma (Far-western), Binaya Shah
(Central) and Krishna Man Shrestha (Tribhuvan Club). |
