Bengaluru FC’s frontmen had a field day at the National Stadium in Male, as Marco Pezzaiuoli’s side ended their AFC Cup campaign with a 6-2 win over Maziya S&RC.
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Bengaluru FC finished their AFC Cup campaign on a high as they thrashed Maziya Sports & Recreation 6-2 at the National Football Stadium in Male on Wednesday. The Blues boss Marco Pezzaiuoli gave starts to a number of youngsters and they displayed some fine one-touch football and clinical finishing to outclass the hosts. Udanta Singh, Cleiton Silva and Leon Augustine scored first-half goals before Sivasakthi Narayanan and Bidyashagar Singh’s brace kept the Blues’ lead intact. Hamza Mohamed and Asadhulla Abdulla had earlier pulled two back for the Maldivian side.
Pezzaiuoli had made five changes to the side that was held to a goalless draw by Bashundhara Kings in the previous game. Sarthak Golui, Pratik Chaudhari, Rohit Kumar, Udanta and Leon started the game with goalkeeper Gurpreet Singh captaining the side in the absence of Sunil Chhetri.
The Indian club started the game brightly and took an early lead in the 6th minute. Sarthak played a one-two with Leon down the right flank before delivering a perfect cross for Udanta to head in. Moments later, the Blues were knocking on the Maziya door again, with Jayesh Rane’s cross a yard ahead of Udanta. Leon further missed a close-range chance from Udanta’s cross.
In the 19th minute, Silva doubled the lead after some poor goalkeeping from Hussain Shareef. The Maziya goalkeeper misjudged the flight of the ball from Rane’s long punt before Silva chased the ball and poked in from close range. The Brazilian netted once again on the half-hour mark but the assistant raised the flag for offside.
Maziya boss Risto Vidakovic was forced to make a change as goalkeeper Shareef was stretchered off and substitute goalkeeper Mamatkhanov was called into action. Few minutes after the incident, Leon made the score 3-0 in favour of Bengaluru FC. Silva released Leon on goal with a one-touch pass and the Kerala-born winger slotted the ball past the substitute goalkeeper. It was a well deserved goal for the 22-year-old as he was causing all sorts of problems to the opposition defence with his pace and relentless running.
Meanwhile, after the break, in the 67th minute, Maziya pulled one back through Hamza Mohamed. The No 10 beat the offside trap and slotted the ball past Gurpreet to make the score 1-3 for Maziya. However, the Blues restored the three goal cushion within three minutes through substitute Sivasakthi. The 20-year-old latched on to Udanta’s cross and scored with a brilliant second-touch finish. It was his first goal for Bengaluru FC.
Maziya reduced the deficit once again in the 80th minute as the goalscorer turned provider this time. Mohamed laid the ball to Abdullah for a simple close range finish. Substitute Bidyashagar Singh then scored twice in the closing stages of the game. Five minutes from time, the former TRAU FC striker received a forward pass from Udanta inside the box and slotted the ball past the Uzbek goalkeeper. In the dying minutes of the game, he scored a similar goal to complete the drubbing.
The win helped Bengaluru FC to a third place finish in Group D with four points from three games, whereas Maziya finished at the bottom of the group.
The Blues are next in action at the 130th edition of Durand Cup, which will be played in Kolkata between September 5 and October 3, 2021. In the other match of the day, ATK Mohun Bagan drew 1-1 against Bashundhara Kings and qualified for the knock-out stage of AFC Cup after finishing on top of Group D with 7 points from 3 games.
