Infant Jesus emerge Goa U-14 school champs

Calangute, Feb 26:  Infant Jesus HS Colva defeated Assagao Union in the finals of Mahindra Youth Football Challenge (MYFC) Under-14 Schools Football Tournament-cum-Talent Hunt organised by GFA at Tilak Maidan, Vasco, on Saturday.
Dominating the initial proceedings, Infant Jesus could have taken an early in the 3rd minute but a Sneeden Rodrigues shot hit the crossbar.  Assagao keeper Aditya Kadam too came to his side’s rescue saving shots from Joseph Maria and Sneeden Rodrigues. 
Infant Jesus finally broke the deadlock in the 20th minute through Jezmon Barretto.  Goaded by success, Infant Jesus doubled the lead through Sneeden Rodrigues in the 22nd minute. 
Changing over, Assagao tried to bounce back into the game with sporadic raids but were unable to beat the last line of the rival defense.  Infant Jesus could have added another goal but the Assagao keeper once again came to his side’s rescue saving a shot from Sneeden.Infant Jesus laid their hands on the Mahindra Youth Football Challenge(MYFC) Cup and Rs 30,000 while Assagao Union had to be content with the runners-up spot and Rs 20,000.  Auxilium High School, Caranzalem claimed the third place and Rs 10,000.  Infant Jesus booked their ticket to Bangalore preliminaries of the competition among the top ranked schools of the country.
Brian Rodrigues and Dylan Lourenco of Infant Jesus won the star player of the finals and best player of the tournament awards respectively.  Dylan Lourenco scored four goals.
The other players to win the awards in the quarter-final stages were Rohan Shaikh (Auxilium), Aditya Kadam (Assagao), Savio Gama (Regina Mundi), Devendra Murgaonkar (Auxilium), Dylan Lourenco (Infant Jesus), Klinff Mendes (Loyola) and Prajat Mandal (Auxilium).
Earlier, in the match to decide the third place finishers, Auxilium High School, Caranzalem got the better of Loyola High School, Margao 2-1.  Karan Shirodker and Prajat Mandal scored for Auxilium while Dilinger Carvalho netted for the losers. A young boy Archilies Miranda displayed his perfect ball control on the filed.
 The chief guest, ex-Olympian Fortunato Franco, guest of honour Bramahnand Sancoalcar, GFA vice-president Lavinio Rebello,  Schubert Furtado, Lawrence Gomes,  Socrates Carvalho, Mariano Dias and others gave away the prizes.