St Mary’s is zilla parishad u-14 football champions

Eva Pitale, Anisha Jagdale, and Surabhi Upadhyay ensure Mary’s glory over a strong and sturdy Gurukul side.

Pune After scoring five goals and conceding none in the semi-final, St Mary’s replicated their performance as they prevailed over Gurukul School with a 3-0 score line in the final of the Zilla Parishad Girls U-14 Championship played at the St Patrick’s School Ground, on Thursday.

Players of St Mary's (white) and Gurukul school (yellow) in action during the u-14 football tournament in Pune on Thursday. (SHANKAR NARAYAN/HT)

Goals from Eva Pitale, Anisha Jagdale, and Surabhi Upadhyay ensured Mary’s glory over a strong and sturdy Gurukul side.

Both teams had performed well in their respective semi-finals, on Wednesday, and started the final on the front foot. However, St Mary’s was able to unsettle the Gurukul defence just three minutes into the game when the side was awarded a free kick right on the edge of the penalty area.

Surprisingly, the usual set piece taker for Mary’s, Anisha, was not standing over the ball for the kick. Winger Eva stepped up and curled her out-swinging effort into the goal to hand Mary’s their opener.

St Mary’s was constantly pushing forward, restricting Gurukul to their half. Riana Verma found herself on the receiving end of a superb diagonal from midfield, but the young attacker placed her shot well wide of goal. After conceding the first goal, Gurukul’s defence stepped up their game and was able to shield numerous attacks. Riana entered the box with the ball yet again, but this time her shot was straight at the goalkeeper, who had her near post covered.

Gurukul finally pushed forward, mid-way through the first half, in an effort to lodge their first attack of the game. The ball was lobbed from midfield towards the Mary’s goal, but before any Gurukul attacker could get to it, the Mary’s keeper pounced on the ball, and hurled it towards the midfield, and suddenly Mary’s were on the counter-attack.

Gurukul defender and skipper Rama Deshmukh’s effective shielding and tackling ensured the counter-attack did not lead to a second goal.

Unlike the semi-finals, there were no silly errors committed in the game by either side. Mary’s launched another attack as Gurukul crowded their penalty area. Amidst all the chaos, Riana tried to shoot from the edge of the box and her effort struck the hand of a Gurukul defender, which led to a penalty for Mary’s. On the stroke of half time, skipper Anisha stepped up to take the penalty and calmly slotted the ball into the bottom-right corner of the goal to give Mary’s a comfortable 2-0 at the end of the first half.

The gameplay and tactics of both the teams looked the same in the second half. Mary’s launched a barrage of attacks, while Gurukul managed to clear every shot that was on target. The goalkeeper of St Mary’s remained a loner throughout the game as Gurukul failed to cross the final third. With the rain pouring down, St Mary’s attackers struggled to get their shots on target. Mary’s won a free kick on the edge of the Gurukul box, but Anisha’s shot did not dip and flew over the crossbar.

Just when it looked as if the scoreline would not change, Mary’s winger Reeva Nimbalkar sprinted down the left flank with the ball and beat her marker, before putting in a brilliant low cross, which caught both centre-backs and the goalkeeper out of their respective positions, and ended up in the feet of Surabhi Upadhyay. The striker poked the ball into an empty net to give Mary’s their third and final goal of the game. Despite being sturdy, the Gurukul defence was unable to cope with the constant press by the attack-minded Mary’s.

QUOTES:

Eva Pitale (St Mary’s, HT Player of the Match): “I’ve played a few tournaments before, but this one has been my best. Everyone in the team has bonded well, and they are like my family. We were really excited before the game and our confidence level shot up after the first goal. We had the belief to win. We played well and won 3-0. I am also happy to see the sportsmanship displayed by other teams we faced in the tournament.”

Devendra Singh Bhandari (coach, St Mary’s): “The tournament was well organised and the pitch was way better than what our U-17 team played on in the Subroto Cup, a few weeks ago. The girls have worked hard in training and they have learnt how to coordinate amongst each other and they deserved to win the title.”

RESULT:FINAL:

St. Mary’s School 3 bt SES’s Gurukul School 0