After a gap of 15 years, Bengal’s girl football team are on the brink of clinching the title of junior national football championship. Bengal girls defeated Delhi by 4-2 via a tie-breaker in the semi-final at Anantapur, Andhra Pradesh, on Thursday.
The match ended goalless in the 90 minutes’ regulation time. In the tie-breaker Kusum Orao, Piu Roy, Adrija Jana and Lovely Mondol scored for Bengal.
Bengal’s coach Rinku Ghosh revealed, while speaking to Parallel Sports from Anantapur after the match, “The players fought till the end. In the tie-breaker also, the players did not get nervous while scoring. Along with them, I must mention our goalkeeper, Rubina Khatun’s name who made a crucial save in the tie-breaker, helping us to reach the final.”
Bengal’s junior girls last clinched the title in 2010 under the guidance of Shukla Nag. Rinku who has been the coach of Bengal’s junior girls for the third consecutive time, sounded optimistic says that this time Bengal will have the last laugh in the final also. Coach lamented that two their shots rebounded off the post. Otherwise, Bengal would have won the match within the 90 minutes’ regulation time.
The girls got hardly a week to train together before leaving for Anantapur. Secondly, with only one alternative day’s gap between the matches in the championship, the young girls often were getting tired.
Rinku, who worked with Adamas University and also guided West Bengal Police to win the State Games, believes Manipur is a tough side. “But I am optimistic about our girls’ mental strength. If they carry out the momentum they maintained today, then we have a fair chance of clinching the title,” added Rinku.
