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Mumbai, February 8: Mumbai FC were unlucky to come out with just a solitary point from their first home match which was played against Sporting Clube de Goa at the refurbished Cooperage football stadium on Sunday evening. The Mumbai club were positive in their approach and enjoyed total domination throughout the match but were forced to share honours with the Goan club in a goalless draw. Mumbai FC is sponsored by Playwin
Mumbai FC, playing in front of over 3,500 home supporters, took control of the proceedings from the opening whistle and created the better chances. Strikers Josimar Da Silva from Brazil and Mohammed Rafi received good support from the midfield, which certainly missed the services of captain Climax Lawrence. However, the Mumbai side were let down by lack of finishing.
They put a lot of pressure on the Sporting Clube defence and had three clear attempts at the rival goal in the first 20 minutes, but without much luck. First in the eighth minute, left half Kuttymani did well to cut in from the left before tapping the ball into the path of Josimar. But the Brazilian was unable to direct his shot on target. Later Cletus Paul saw two his well-executed free-kicks saved by an alert Sporting Clube goalkeeper Ravi Kumar who had quite a busy time under the bar.
After the change of ends, Mumbai FC continued to hold the upper hand but failed to get clear shots on target. In the 53rd minute Mumbai FC’s Japanese recruit Taisuke Matsugae combined with Rafi to break through only to fire straight into the hands of goalkeeper Kumar and seven minutes later from a swift counter Josimar charged towards the rival goal but he delayed in releasing the ball and was foiled by the rival defender.
The Goans hardly troubled the Mumbai FC defence and could only manage a couple of raids towards the rival citadel. The Goan defence marshalled by stoppers Sandesh Jhingan and Miguel Garcia combined well to deny Mumbai FC from creating too many chances.
Mumbai FC have now opened their account with one point from this draw in four games while the Goans have two from their second draw also from four matches.
Khalid Jamil, the coach of the Mumbai club was satisfied with the result. “I am happy with the one point we got from this match and now we will go step by step from here,” he said at the post-match press briefing.
“I missed Climax for this match and the players were also under pressure because this was our first home match after five years. The experience of Climax would certainly have helped us to push for a win,” he further said.
Results: Mumbai FC 0 drew with Sporting Clube de Goa 0.
