MAPUSA: Vasco Sports Club fought hard to hold Churchill Brothers Sports Club to a 1-1 draw, in the GFA’s Taca Goa U-20, at Duler Stadium, Mapusa, on Monday.
After a barren first half Sandeep Subba gave Churchill the lead with Klusner Pereira coming with the equaliser for Vasco.
The teams displayed midfield tactics for major duration of the match with moves few and far between.
Churchill managed to create some openings twice in the first half, however first Sunveer Singh’s header off Leander D’Cunha’s freekick was cleanly collected by the keeper and then Sandeep Subba’s rasping right footer zoomed past the Vasco goal.
Both the teams continued to defend their citadel at the same time tried to break the defence of the opponent and score the much desired. At halftime the scores read 0-0.
On resumption of play Sanwil D’Costa worked his way past the Vasco defenders and unleashed a powerful strike which was pushed away by the diving Vasco keeper Darshan Ambore.
Churchill Bros. finally managed to break the deadlock in the 60th minute of play when Sanwil D’Costa sent a deep cross into the Vasco danger zone which was nodded home by Sandeep Subba to make it 1-0.
The Vasco outfit did not give their opponents much time to bask in the glory of the goal when couple of minutes later Chuchill Bros keeper Swisfron tipped over Biswajeet Rajput’s curling free kick for a corner, which was eventually converted into a goal through Kulsner Pereira’s firm header, 1-1.
Thereon Vasco came close twice to turning the match in their favour but Churchill keeper did well to stop Tristan Falcao’s blistering shot and then goal scorer Klusner saw his curling shot kissed the Churchill woodwork and rebound back into play, however there was no striker to put the ball back into the nets for Vasco.
With Vasco trying to get a goal, Churchill Bros took advantage and sent in a counter-attack towards the fag end of the match.
Vasco keeper did a commendable job to deny Churchill’s Sandeep Subba from scoring from a one on one situation.
