MAPUSA: Sporting Clube de Goa conquered the top spot of the Goa Pro League in style through a 2-1 victory as Churchill Brothers Sports Club faced their first defeat after the 10th round match at Duler Stadium, here, on Wednesday.
It was the Varca side who had humbled the Flaming Oranje by a 3-0 win in their first leg encounter.
With Wednesday’s win, Sporting Clube go atop with 20 points while Churchill Brothers stay at 19 points from equal number of matches.
Sporting Clube were presented with a golden opportunity to take the lead in the 12th minute of play when Churchill Bros keeper Aliston Fernandes brought down Sporting Clube’s Ganesh Thakur inside the 18-yard box, forcing referee Marion Pereira to point to the penalty spot.
However, to the dismay of their large fan gathering, Nigerian Odafa Okolie’s strike from the spot was saved by the diving Churchill Bros keeper.
Minutes later, Nicholas Fernandes, who currently occupies the position of the league’s highest scorer, made a threatening run into the rival danger zone but failed to beat Sporting Clube custodian Kamaljit Singh in one-to-one situation.
Despite his fine performance under the horizontal bar Kamaljit was left rooted to the ground in the 29th minute when Seriton Fernandes weaved his way past the Sporting Clube defence and unleashed a rasping strike which crashed into the nets, 1-0.
Sporting Clube could have levelled terms within a few minutes gap. However, Mauvin Borges saw his curling effort miss the target by a whisker.
The 38th minute of play witnessed the second penalty of the match when Churchill Bros Elvis Barretto was found guilty by the referee of handling Quan Gomes strike, inside the penalty box. Odafa once again stepped up and this time found the back of the nets to give his side the much needed equaliser.
The change of ends saw both the sides reduce the tempo of the match with moves few and far between.
In the 82nd minute, Odafa on collecting the ball from Mauvin, fired in a powerful left footer which was brilliantly paired away by keeper Aliston at the expense of a corner.
The ensuing move saw Creson Antao rise high to nod home Cajetan Fernandes corner, 2-1.
Sporting Clube almost made it 3-1 in the later moments of the match but Rowlin Borges saw his freekick from the edge of the box hit his fellow teammate and go wide.
