Bengaluru: Mohun Bagan Super Giant (MBSG) thrashed Bengaluru FC 4-0 at the Sree Kanteerava Stadium here on Thursday night to take the battle for the ISL 2023-24 League Shield to the wire. With 45 points from 21 games, the Mariners are trailing top-placed Mumbai City FC by two points. The Islanders and the Mariners clash at the Salt Lake Stadium in Kolkata on Monday.
The equation was pretty simple for Mohun Bagan. They approached the game with a similar vision, unleashing their attacking personnel on the field and giving them a free hand to work their magic around the Bengaluru unit. With four different scorers in Hector Yuste, Manvir Singh, Anirudh Thapa, and Armando Sadiku, the Mariners broke no sweat in capping off one of their most convincing victories of the campaign so far.
It began with Hector hammering home a rebound in the 17th minute. Having earned a corner, Dimitrios Petratos spotted Hector in a slightly vacant spot near the right post and the latter attempted a shot that deflected back to him after hitting the crossbar. The midfielder held his nerve, making space and netting it in to get a foot ahead in the game. Defender Anwar Ali nearly undid that 22 minutes later, bringing down Bengaluru forward Sunil Chhetri inside the box. Chhetri stepped up to take the spot-kick, but shot at the crossbar instead, making the Blues go into the break trailing by a goal.
The Mariners sealed the game in the opening 15 minutes of the second half though, with attacker Manvir playing a major role. Manvir played a pass to Joni Kauko, who waited for his teammate to sprint past him to make a back-heeled pass towards the Indian winger. Manvir received the delivery, unlocked the backline of the Blues and simply slid the ball into the back of the net in the 51st minute. A fast break three minutes later tripled the lead of the Mariners, with Thapa getting his name on the scoresheet this time around.
Petratos collected the ball near the halfway mark before producing a solo effort and laying the ball for Kauko in the middle. Kauko tried his luck from distance, but the rebound landed on Petratos’ feet, who squared up the pass for Thapa to round off the move.
Manvir continued teasing the Bengaluru defence from one end, as he raced down the left flank and beat his markers for sheer pace before laying up a straightforward assist that Sadiku scored from in the 59th minute of the match.
(With inputs from ISL Media)
