East Bengal fought hard to fall before mighty Mumbai City FC

Amrinder Singh-Mumbai City FC

The 67th match of the Hero Indian Super League saw a very interesting clash between league toppers Mumbai City FC and a spirited and improving SC East Bengal. The match was mostly dominated by the Red and Golds, but they lost it owing to a lone goal by Mourtada Fall and their own inability to finish juicy chances. 

The Red and Golds played better football all round – they had better passing accuracy, touches, about twice the number of passes, even more, crosses and corners. They even had a superior ball possession of 60%. But this was one of those days when it all did not translate to a 3 point gain in the points table. The Islanders won 1-0, thanks to a Mourtada Fall special who was a rock in their defence. His goal was the sole thing that decided the fate of today’s match at the Tilak Maidan Stadium.

In their reverse fixture, the Red and Golds had lost 3-0 to the Islanders. Since then, they had come a long way. They were on an unbeaten 7-match streak and while they were playing well, they were not scoring enough goals. 

There were 5 draws in that 7 match streak and with a lot of saves from Debjit Majumder. He had made 41 saves till the start of today’s match which was the highest in the league. On the other hand, Mumbai City FC was on an unbeaten run of 10 matches and by far, the most formidable side in this current season of the Hero ISL. 

The match began with the Islanders going on an all-out attack, trying to coax out an error in the SC East Bengal defence. The first chance came for the Islanders as Adam Le Fondre‘s long-range shot went wide of the goal post in the 3rd minute of the first half. 

It was Mumbai City FC again in the 12th minute as Rowllin Borges‘ shot from the edge of the box was not good enough to beat Debjit in the goalpost. Again after a couple of minutes, Hugo Boumous found an opportunity from a rare fumble by Debjit as he couldn’t collect a Cy Goddard cross. Boumous’ attempt towards goal went wayward and above the crossbar, saving Debjit the blushes.

Mourtada Fall then gave them the lead as he broke the deadlock 27 minutes into the game. Cy Goddard curled in a beautiful corner which was handled again by Boumous before reaching an unmarked Mourtada Fall for a spectacular header into the goal. 

SC East Bengal then picked up the pace and kept on troubling the Islanders with their midfield possession game but an equaliser was hard to come by. Midfielders controlled the game at this point. Narayan Das, Anthony Pilkington and Bright Enobakhare kept troubling the Mumbai City FC defence, but as their finishing kept troubling the Red and Golds throughout the season, today was no exception. 

Scott Neville‘s shot at the 85th minute and Harmanpreet Singh‘s header at the 87th minute was the last couple of chances that they could conjure up before the final whistle. The 5 minutes of extra time saw Bright Enobakhare’s attempt to draw a header out of  Aaron Joshua Holloway go in vain and that was it. 

Hero of the Match: MOURTADA FALL

The award for the Hero of the Match went to Mourtada Fall for scoring the winning goal early on in the match and staying rock-solid in the defence and the award for the DHL Winning Pass of the Match went to Hugo Boumous for assisting the lone goal.

https://twitter.com/IndSuperLeague/status/1352656293454958595
It was a tough match to win but an even worse match to lose for the Red and Golds but they’d want to come back stronger in their next match against FC Goa on 29th January. The Islanders on the other hand now extend their lead at the top of the points table and face Chennaiyin FC on the 25th of January.