SAFF U-16: Nepal and Afghanistan enter semi-final

Hosts Nepal and Afghanistan entered the semifinal of the ongoing South Asian Football Federation (SAFF) U16 football championship here at Kathmandu.

Nepal beat defending champions Pakistan 3 – 0 in the group A match of the championship. Bimal Gharti Magar scored two goals for Nepal while Sujan Limbu scored one goal to secure victory for the hosts.

Nepal just needed a point from the today’s match to qualify for the semifinal. Limbu scored an opening goal in the 13th minute while Magar doubled the tally in the 65th minutes and added another one in the 73rd minute of the game.

Meanwhile in another Group A encounter, Afghanistan beat Bhutan 3 – 1 to enter the semifinal along with Nepal from Group A.

Bhutan took the lead in the 19th minute through Tenzing Shezang while Afghanistan levelled the score in the 27th minute of the match through Waziri. Then Nazar Ahmed scored in the 63rd minute to make the score 2 – 1 for the Afghanistan, and scored again 92nd minute of the match to win the game 3 – 1 for Afghanistan.

Nepal advance to the semifinal as group A winner with 7 points (2 win and 1 draw). Afghanistan enter the semifinal as the runners up of the group A with 5 points (1 win and 2 draw).

India and Bangladesh are also already in the semifinal from Group B. Both India and Bangladesh have beaten Sri Lanka, who are already out of the championship with two defeats.

However, these two teams are set to play in their last group stage match on Thursday to decide the winner and runners up of the group.