A late strike from substitute Suraj Singh sealed a 2-1 victory for Madras Engineering Group (MEG) over South United besides sparking fracas on the touchline in the BDFA Super Division played at the Bangalore Football Stadium on Monday.
The controversial nature of the goal, which came in the 89th minute, soured a thrilling contest with the coaches getting involved in a verbal battle at the full-time whistle.
With the score reading 1-1, South United had played the ball out of bounds to ensure their player Santosh R received medical attention. When play resumed MEG attempted to return the ball to their opponents, who seemed disinterested, and the referee was left with no choice but to play on.
Sajeesh Mutath lofted a calculated pass into the box and Suraj, unmarked at the far post, made no mistake as he found the left bottom corner of the net for what turned out to be the winning goal.
At the final whistle, United’s coach Santosh made his way to the opposition dug-out and after a few heated words, looked to shove his counter-part Shaji before the players and officials intervened to avert further confrontation.
Earlier, MEG begun the game at a frenetic pace hogging bulk of the possession and mounting pressure on United’s backline. Their efforts succeeded as Sajeesh opened the scoring in the 13th minute.
United’s defence failed to clear the ball to safety and it fell to the midfielder, whose well-placed effort from 20 yards out whizzed past custodian Srijith.
The rest of the first period remained largely uneventful with both sides creating chances but lacking the killer instinct in front of the goal.
In the second period, United came out determined and their constant efforts to break the MEG defence were rewarded in the 68th minute.
Santosh’s shot from outside the area took a massive deflection off an MEG defender and broke to Subash, who had just the onrushing goalkeeper Renju S Mohan to beat. The United striker, who had been a livewire all game, remained composed and curled his ball into the net to restore parity.
As the game looked to be heading towards a draw, Suraj struck, upsetting the South United bunch and ensuring three points for his team.
In the ‘A’ Division tie, ADE and SAI played out a d 1-1 draw.
SAI’s Deep Majumdar opened the scoring in the 26th minute but the scores were level in the 42nd minute as Kabilan struck for ADE.