Football
ISL 2019: ATK and Mumbai City FC survive with goals at the death
The winter evening at jampacked Saltlake Stadium came out to be a set of dramatic scenes as ATK FC and Mumbai City FC shared their points at the last moment of the game in Indian Super League. It was Sossairaj and Roy Krishna’s heroics that earned the host a solitary point from the harsh and too physical game against visiting Mumbai FC side with 2-2 on scorecard. Â
The game started with the visitor’s domination over possession but as time passed by ATK took the game on their part with their flank play starting to take off with Prabir Das and Soosairaj’s solo run with the ball. Edu Garcia came out to be the perfect playmaker to control the momentum from the midfield as the Spaniard gained his first start of the season.
The Mumbai City defence started to fumble as they failed to maintain the composure in the back wall leaving loopholes for the host to create chances thus forcing the visitors to opt towards a much physical game as they continued to make some high foot tackles against the ATK strikers. But the strategy seemed to have not worked well as ATK opened their account in the just before the break with a terrific goal from Michael Sossairaj. In the 38th minute, Edu Garcia passed the ball just near the box as Sossairaj just added a touch lifting the ball over the keeper as the defence stood still.
The second half started with an added advantage for Mumbai City FC as the referee turned out to be a blind man to all the harsh tackles brought in by the visitors as the man in the middle declined to bring out the cards out from his pocket though the situation started heating up at the pitch. The situation turned more favourable for them when Kevyn Angoue came in place of in the 49th minute who set the positive game along the flanks for Mumbai creating threats in the ATK box.
Sarthak Golui and Paulo Machoda continued to show their best on the field as they continued to add hopes to the visitors. It continued to turn harsh for ATK as the Antonio Lopez Habbas lead side was forced to replace Carl Mc Hugh with Agus Garcia in the defence as the former got his ankle twisted. This led to some lack of composure in the defence of the flying tigers as they conceded the first goal from a corner at 62nd minute. The clumsiness in the ATK defence left Arindam with no space to come out and clear the ball as he was blocked by his own man. The game lost its all momentum in the second half as the free play was totally turned down by the too physical attempts from the Mumbai side.
The drama continued at the jam-packed stadium of Kolkata as half off all the goals came in the extra time. It was in the 90+2nd minute when Mumbai gained their second goal as Kevyn Angoue scored his first goal of the season as tapped substitute Bipin Sing’s low cross perfectly to the back of the net. ATK seemed not to lose their hope as the Red and White captain came out with an almost end minute equalizer at the 90+5th minute making the teams share their points at Kolkata.
With eleven points from six matches, ATK remain at the top of the table as Mumbai also remain on the 7th spot with six points from six matches.
